Chronus
by Mummyluvr
Summary: Two years after Dean’s death, Sam finds a way to save him. As usual, something goes horribly wrong, and the youngest Winchester is thrown into a chaotic future of demonic making. Even worse, he’s found Dean.
1. Welcome To Existence

**Title: **Chronus

**Summary: **Two years after Dean's death, Sam finds a way to save him. As usual, something goes horribly wrong, and the youngest Winchester is thrown into a chaotic future of demonic making. Even worse, he's found Dean.

**Rating: **T

**A/N: **This story has been a long time coming. I got the idea while watching Charmed reruns while I was in the middle of writing Shifter. I finished that story, then got pneumonia, so I was too weak to start this one. I got better, wrote about six pages, then Charlie the Unicorn 2 came out. I had to make the Supernatural version, and that took a week. Then I had to graduate, go to parties, etc., Finally, though, I was able to finish the story. Here it is. Please enjoy it.

**Warning:** Spoilers for most of Supernatural Season 3

**Disclaimer: **Supernatural doesn't belong to me. The writers may reference my fics from time to time, but I don't get paid for it. It's a pity, really.

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**Chronus**

_Chapter 1_

_Welcome to Existence_

Two years, and he still got two queens. Two years, and he still expected to see that flimsy piece of wood that passed as a door fly open and announce his brother's arrival. Two years, and he was still searching. Two years, and he'd finally found it.

Sammy stumbled into the room, wiping the blood from his hands onto his dark shirt, shaking wild hair out of his face, heart clenching as the amulet of unknown origin glinted from its spot on his chest.

Two years. It had been two years since those damned hounds came for his brother, and he had finally found a way to save the older man.

Sam let himself plop down on the bed farthest from the door, the bed that had been his since before he could remember. He reached into his pocket, slowly, as if afraid that the magical hunk of stone that had cost so much might have disappeared.

It was still there. He pulled it from its safe hiding place, unwrapping the blood-spotted hanky that had been wrapped around it. He took time to savor the moment, to gaze at his prize, the monogrammed package. MR.

In another life, Sam might have cared who the handkerchief had once belonged to. He might have cared about his methods in retrieving said handkerchief. Hell, he might have even felt bad about it. But times had changed. Sam had changed. What was one more droplet of blood on his stained permanent record? What was one more bitch to add to the ever-growing list?

Ruby. Lilith. Bela. He smirked. The last one had put up a fight. The last one had actually been kinda fun. Finding her, tracking her, tricking her, killing her. In his other life, that would have scared him, but now it was just business, just another stepping stone to Dean. To Hell.

He closed his fingers around the small sundial, the final piece to the puzzle. He could fix everything now. Maybe not his own damaged psyche, but everything else. Everything that was fixable.

Sam's gaze traveled from his fisted hand to the table, the altar. He'd stumbled across the ritual nearly two weeks before, and had been gathering the ingredients ever since. The lamb's blood had been easy to come by, as had the various other artifacts. The sundial, though, had been the problem. It was the key, and it had been lost to the ages.

So, he'd done what anyone in his position would. He'd done some digging, found someone who'd found a loophole, and had acted. He'd offered up a fake name and a large sum of money that he would never have to the only person who could get him what he needed. She delivered, and he stabbed. He'd never seen Ruby's knife kill a human before, had been worried about the lack of flashes and convulsions, but he'd stabbed the British bitch right through her back. He hadn't had to stay and wait for the light show. It was a sure thing.

He stood slowly, savoring the moment of victory. He could see it in his mind, see the way that things were supposed to be. He'd perform the ritual, go back in time, save himself from Jake and that damned knife. In doing so, he would save Dean. He would save Dean, and they could spend the rest of their lives together, as a family, just as God had intended. If there was a God. Sam wasn't so sure anymore.

Everything was ready. It was the moment that he'd been waiting for since Dean had first admitted to hallucinating, to seeing things that he shouldn't have been seeing, to becoming Hell's bitch. It was what he'd wanted since he'd woken up in that fleabag of a house in Cold Oak, since he'd discovered the truth, since he'd shot Jake dead for killing what was left of the Winchester family.

He placed the sundial in the center of the elaborate altar and fell to his knees before it. His eyes slid shut as he recited the incantation that he'd converted to memory so long ago. He tried to visualize his brother, to think of Dean as he had been, happy and healthy and full of life. He tried to block the image of his broken, bloody, mauled brother from his mind, to rid his thoughts of the scattering of flesh and blood that the hellhound had left in its wake.

Sam choked back emotion, his eyes snapping open as his voice filled with the tears he'd been holding back for the past two years. Soldiers didn't cry, that was what his father had taught him. Soldiers didn't cry, and neither did Dean, even when facing down an eternity of torment.

"Stop it," Sam, muttered, shaking his head. He couldn't veer off into thoughts of that day, not now, not when it was so important to focus.

Bela's blood was still on his hands, still on his clothes, and he realized that that was a bad thing. He wasn't entirely sure how the ritual worked, and he couldn't chance being seen this way. He gained his feet and stumbled into the bathroom.

The mirror was cracked and smudged, but Sam could still see more of himself than he really wanted to. Blood had splashed up onto his face in a sick imitation of that night, his first real kill. His eyes were hard, glazed over. Dark hair hung in a face that had once been so soft, so compassionate. He didn't even look like Sammy Winchester anymore. He looked like a cold-blooded killer.

And he was.

Ruby had been first. The lying skank had promised salvation for Dean, and when she'd failed to deliver- as soon as he'd _realized_ that she'd failed to deliver- she'd been marked for death. He'd hunted her, stalked her, actually _scared_ her. Lilith had hidden her well, but Sam had contacts, Sam knew he could find her, knew that there was a job to do and he had better damn well do it. She'd begged when he finally revealed himself, when he moved faster than she'd ever imagined he could. In a fit of rage and poetic justice- _more like a limerick, really_, Dean had said once- he'd killed her with her own knife, stained it with the blood of a new host. Her own special magic knife. Right through her gut.

He smiled at the memory, at the feeling of her life-force running from her body, slicking the floor, her intestines in his hands. He'd savored it. His first kill since that night. Far from his last, though.

He ran water from the tap, his smile fading as he noted its color. Back when he'd been with Dean, their water was clear. The motels weren't always the nicest, but at least the water looked like _water_, and not milk. It had never been this thick and white back then, back before he'd seen eyes that resembled this water, that bored into his soul and threatened to take him.

Really, he didn't even count the demon as a murder. It wasn't his fault about the host. He hadn't chosen her. And it had just been instinct. After spending nearly a year tracking the thing that was supposed to be trying to kill him, after finding out that it was the one that held his brother's soul, that he couldn't get Dean back by making his own deal, his reaction had been understandable.

He'd thought that he could bring Dean back by offering not to interfere. He'd been getting close when the knock had come at the door and that creepy little kid stared up at him with soulless white eyes. He hadn't even thought about it, just pulled the knife, slamming her up against the doorframe with all the strength he could muster and demanding his brother. The little bitch had smiled at him. That girl had been dead before she even hit the ground.

Sam turned off the water and stared back at his reflection, wiping the blood from his face. He pulled off his shirt and ventured back into the room to find a new one. He scratched absently at the crimson that stained the bronze of his brother's necklace. Dean's blood just wouldn't come off. A constant reminder, a little piece of the man, the myth, the legend that had been left behind just for little bro. Lucky him.

He felt cleaner after washing up and changing, felt ready to face the past, to save himself and Dean. He knelt again in front of the altar, closing his eyes, chanting, visualizing Dean. He saw the older man as he had been, all smiles and prank wars and mullet rock. He saw eyes that told more than words ever could, calloused hands that had sewn up many a wound, a subtle spattering of freckles. He smiled.

The image in his mind changed as the ritual came to a close, as the incantation was nearly finished. It always seemed to happen that way when he imagined his brother, always warped the man that he'd needed his whole life into something that he should never have had to become. Shining eyes turned dark, the loveable smirk sinister. The familiar face took on a darker tone and Sam couldn't help but shudder. This was what his brother had become because of him. This what he was going back to change.

Black eyes swam before his mind, wind began rushing in his ears, blowing his hair around his face. He teetered on his knees, nearly falling over. He reached out for the altar only to find it spinning away from him, the ground falling from beneath him. His mind wavered, his stomach protested, and those black eyes just kept staring. He whispered his brother's name, and fell from the world.

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Well, there's chapter 1. As you can tell, I'm trying to write about Sam for once. If I'm failing miserably, please tell me, because I'd really like to know. Heck, even if I'm not failing, a review would be nice :)


	2. Welcome To The Fallout

Sorry about the slight delay in posting. We had really bad storms last night and I had to write thank you cards during the day.

Anywho, please enjoy this chapter. It really kicks things off in the story :)

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_Chapter 2_

_Welcome To The Fallout_

White hot pain laced through Sam's skull as he struggled to sit up. He blinked, forcing his eyes open, trying to clear his head as the pain receded, leaving him dazed. He pushed himself up onto his elbows, away from the dusty shag carpeting.

Shag?

Every instinct his father had instilled within him kicked into overdrive at that one observation, his brain whirring to life. _Shag._ The motel room he'd performed the ritual in hadn't had shag carpeting. It had worked. It had actually worked.

For the first time in two years, Sam could feel hope rising within him. He didn't have to be alone anymore, didn't have to watch his own back. He didn't have to wake in the middle of the night with dreams of the torture his brother was enduring because of him still fresh in his mind. He didn't have to be so mechanical, so emotionless, so drained anymore. For the first time in two years, he actually felt like a person again.

He scrambled to his feet, senses alert, eyes and ears and nose and heart taking in everything that they could without overloading. It had worked. He was going to fix everything. Maybe even himself.

But the room was unfamiliar. It was dark, the windows boarded over, melted candle wax spilling over the sides of old bowls that had been too small to contain it as the fire ran out. The only things present besides the burnt-down candles were a single bed, a small television, and a small table. Trash had accumulated in one corner, and the bathroom door had been broken off.

It wasn't right. Sure, he and Dean had stayed in some pretty run-down places, but never anything this bad. Never anything that could be a hazard to their health.

Still, there was a possibility that he'd overshot, that he'd gone back to a time so far before the deal that Dean hadn't been concerned about health issues. It was possible that he'd gone back to the time when he'd been at college.

His stomach tying itself into nervous knots, a welcome feeling after two years without so much as a twinge, Sam approached the bed, keeping his feet quiet on the grimy carpet. He reached a tentative hand forward, wrapped long fingers around thin sheets, and slowly pulled what passed as covers from the single lump lying there. He held his breath. He let himself hope.

The kid in the bed wasn't Dean. He was skinny, no older than nineteen, with a shaggy mop of dirty-blond hair and features that were too soft, too weak to be his brother's.

Something inside of Sam clicked. It was the same thing that had clicked when the trickster had made him live for nearly three months without his brother, the same thing that clicked when the time had actually come to say good-bye. It was like a switch, not the ones that Ava had told him about, the ones that triggered psychic phenomena and eventually turned good people into killers. No, it was something completely different. It was the thing that made him numb.

He dropped the sheet and turned from the bed. For a brief moment, he considered killing the kid, making him suffer for pulling such a mean prank. For getting Sam's hopes up. But the switch had flipped, and he didn't care. He didn't care about the kid. He didn't care about himself. He didn't care about what he had done wrong, because this wasn't his motel room, and it wasn't Dean's.

Of course, that didn't mean that he'd been entirely wrong. It was always possible that Dean was there, just in another room. Time travel wasn't an exact science, after all; more of a crap shoot, really.

Hope welled up within him again as he considered the possibility. Maybe Dean was in another room, maybe all he had to do was look for his brother. Yeah. That seemed reasonable.

Casting one last glance at the stranger in the bed, Sam headed toward the door. The knob was cool to the touch, stained with something dark. For a moment, he imagined that it was blood, but that was impossible. What would blood be doing on the door knob?

Sam unlocked the door and backed out of the room, smiling to himself. He would look for the car in the parking lot, or check at the front desk for a Jim Rockford. He would find his brother and save them both. Then everything would be fine. Everything would be just the way it was supposed to be.

He spun around as the door clicked shut, and gasped. The landscape that stretched before him was even more unfamiliar than the battered room had been. Dried grass crumbled under the breeze as lightning forked across a desolate gray sky. Wind blew through the barren branches of dead trees. The silence was deafening, and a cold chill ran down Sam's spine. Wherever- or _when_ever- he was, it certainly wasn't Kansas anymore.

Hands shoved deep into his pockets, Sam gazed over the cracked pavement of the parking lot, searching in vain for the Impala. There weren't any cars there, weren't any people that he could see. There was nothing.

He turned toward what he hoped was the office, walking past boarded-up doors and broken windows. The office was just as bad. Wood nailed over the entrance, shattered glass scattered along the sidewalk. He peeked in through the window anyway, looking for signs of life, and saw none.

The wind gusted around him as Sam looked back toward the motel room, at a complete loss. He had to find out where he was, when he was. He had to find out what he'd done wrong so that he could undo it and try again later. And he figured that the easiest way to do that would be to ask the kid in the motel room.

He had just turned to go back and confront the boy when he heard what sounded like voices drifting his way from farther down the street. He stepped out toward the parking lot, eyes narrowed, searching.

A man and a woman were walking side-by-side down the street, deep in conversation. A black cloud of smoke that vaguely resembled a dog hung at their heels, shifting in the wind, its eyes glowing with the fires of Hell.

Sam's blood froze in his veins as he watched the couple walking with the hellhound, sometimes turning and talking to it like most people talk to their pets. As they grew closer he could see that their eyes were oily black, the eyes of the possessed. He ducked back into the shadows, trying to avoid being spotted as they walked toward the motel, across the broken street.

He slunk through the shadows, sticking close to the walls, as they approached. By the time he reached the room, the only one that wasn't still boarded up, the couple had made it to the lot. Sam opened the door and slid inside, letting his eyes slide shut with relief as he got something solid between the demons and himself, as the adrenalin faded from his bloodstream.

The sound of a gun cocking brought him back to his senses.

Sam's eyes snapped open to reveal that the boy he'd left asleep in the bed was now very much awake. The kid narrowed his eyes, glaring at the hunter as the gun glinted in the dim morning light.

Sam was quick in pulling his own weapon, brandishing the knife that he'd taken from Ruby nearly two years before. He smirked as he caught the uncertainty in the boy's eyes.

"Holy shit," the kid muttered, lowering the gun to get a better look at the intruder.

Sam wasn't phased by what appeared to be wonder. He'd gotten in the habit of getting down to business since his brother's death, and this was no different than any of the hunts he'd been on since that day. "Watch the language, there, kiddo," he quipped, taking a step toward the kid.

In the old days, he would have been afraid of getting shot, of dying, of leaving Dean alone. Now, though, death seemed a welcome release. Maybe he'd even get lucky. Maybe the murders of countless demons and one bitch would be viewed as evil. Maybe he could meet up with his brother again.

"It's impossible," the kid whispered, staring at Sam with wide eyes and a ghost of a smile.

"Just tell me who you are," he said, knife held steady as the boy's gun began to dip toward the floor, "and tell me where my brother is."

The teenager broke out into a full-fledged smile at that, tucking his gun into the waistband of his jeans. "Sammy," he said, "it's me." His eyes turned black as a moonless night, his tone amiable, body relaxed. "It's Dean."


	3. Everybody's Watching You Now

All right. I'm glad that people are interested in this, seeing how long it took me to write it :) _

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_Chapter 3_

_Everybody's Watching You Now_

"That's impossible." He was across the room, shoving the demon against the wall, pressing the blade of the knife against its neck before the damned thing could even blink.

"Really?"

"My brother's dead. He's in Hell."

"Been there, done that, broke out."

Sam pushed the thing farther into the wall. "You shut up. You're not him."

"Then why haven't you killed me?" The demon glanced down at the blade before looking back up into Sam's eyes. "If I'm really such a big, bad, black-eyed bastard, I should be dead now, right? But you can't do it because you're not sure."

The hunter squared himself up against the accusation, curling his lips back and snarling at the creature that was currently at his mercy. "I told you to shut up."

The demon smirked, and for a moment Sam was hit with such a wave of déjà vu that his grip on it nearly faltered. That expression, the glint in the eyes, it was if he were staring at his brother again.

"Come on, Sammy-"

That brought him back to his senses. "_Don't_ call me that."

"All right, all right. Sam, then. Come on. Let's just take a breather and talk about this."

"There's nothing for you to talk about. Just tell me where we are."

"About twenty miles outside of Cold Oak."

Sam narrowed his eyes. "That's impossible. This isn't South Dakota."

"Oh, it is," the demon said, "but I wouldn't expect you to recognize it. It's been so long."

He reapplied the force that he'd originally put on the demon, pushing it further back into peeling wallpaper and cracking plaster. "What the Hell are you talking about?"

"How long's your brother been dead?"

"That's none of your business."

The demon raised his head a bit, just a simple upward tilt of the chin, his now-brown eyes glinting in the light spilling through the cracks in-between the boards on the window. "Two years, huh?"

"Get outta my head."

The thing claiming to be Dean shook his head. "How'd you get here, Sam?"

"Again, none of your business."

That slight cock of the chin again. "Time travel. Great. I thought you knew enough not to mess with crap like that. Dad always said-"

"You're not him!"

To his surprise, the demon actually flinched at the remark, his mouth turning down in sadness. "You have no idea what's going on, do you? You just got dumped here outta the time stream."

"I know enough. I know it's my job to kill things like you."

"But you still won't do it. You're as scared and confused as you'll let yourself be. You want answers, and you know I can give 'em to you."

"Demons lie."

"Brothers don't. And you've gotta believe me, Sammy."

He shook his head. "You can't be Dean. He's dead. He's in Hell. He's only been gone two years. It's gotta take longer than that."

"Try twenty."

"What?"

The demon did its best to shrug while being held against the wall. "Well, technically, fifteen. I made a break when the second Gate opened."

"You trying to tell me that I… I went… _forward_?"

"Weirder things have been known to happen."

And for a moment, he almost believed the damned thing. For a moment, it was like he was talking to his brother, working on a case. But he paused, and it gave him that same invading look, and he remembered. He remembered as blood began to drip slowly from the creature's nose, as its eyes regained that unholy darkness.

"You don't believe me?" it said, eyes narrowed, "fine. But I can prove it. Turn on the TV."

Sam stared at the thing as its eyes slid back to their normal brown. TV. That, at least, was a source that he could trust. Slowly, he backed away from the demon, keeping the knife trained on it, his eyes never leaving its stolen form as the boy slumped from the wall and sat down on the bed.

In one quick movement, Sam swept up the remote and turned so that he could see both the TV screen and the demon that sat hunched over on the bed. He pointed the remote and turned the set on, watching as static lit up the screen. He hit the button to change the channel, but found the same thing. Every channel, every station, static blared. He glared at the demon.

"Channel 1246," the monster said. "Trust me."

Sam didn't, but he changed the channel anyway. He was surprised to see the static disappear to be replaced by a shadowy figure sitting behind what appeared to be an old news desk. He turned up the volume.

"If you're just tuning in," the man hidden in the shadows was saying, "I'm here to report that The Resistance has lost two of its members this weekend. Lucas and Andrea Barr were last heard from just south of Paris, Texas. They will be missed dearly."

Sam turned to the demon. "What's he talking about?"

"Hunt gone wrong."

"They were killed?" Suddenly, his heart hurt. It had been years since he'd seen either of the remaining members of the Barr family. Hell, he could barely even remember them. But he remembered what they'd done to Dean, what that little mute boy had brought out in him, and he'd silently thanked the kid for the chance to see part of his big brother that he'd never been able to glimpse before. They couldn't be dead.

The demon shook its stolen head. "Not dead. Worse."

Sam turned back to the television, where the shadowed reporter was finishing the announcement. "That being said," the hidden figure continued, "they should be avoided at all cost. Do not trust them. Again, if you're just tuning in, the Barr family has been compromised. If you come into contact with them, run if an exorcism is deemed impossible. I repeat, the Barr family has been compromised."

Sam looked back at the demon as if seeing it- _him_- for the first time. A fate worse than death, a fate that he had passed to the boy he was possessing. Such a hypocrite.

Static began washing over the screen, pulling Sam from his thoughts as what was apparently a news report ended. "This is Ben Braeden with your daily Resistance update, nine a.m., April twenty-fourth, 2028. Stay safe out there, guys. We're counting on you."

The screen became completely engulfed in static as Sam lifted the remote in his quickly numbing hand and turned off the television. He turned to the demon, too scared to let himself hope again, to let himself feel, but knowing that it was all about to come bursting through the floodgates anyway. He was so sure this time, how could it not?

"Dean?"

The man on the bed smiled. "Yeah?"

"What the Hell happened?"


	4. Between How It Is And How It Should Be

All right. Anybody else thinking that we need to know what's going on here? Time to get some answers!_

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_Chapter 4_

_Between How It Is And How It Should Be_

"Oh, so now you believe me?"

Sam stepped closer, suddenly unable to breathe, unable to think, unable to do anything but stare at the brother he thought he'd lost. "You're kinda a hypocrite," he managed.

"Excuse me?"

Sammy shrugged, his strength slowly returning. He dropped the remote back onto the scratched wooden table and returned his knife to its designated place at his side. "Well, yeah. You sell your soul so you won't have to be alone, but in doing so you leave me all alone and you won't let me save you. You say that possession is a fate worse than death when that is clearly not your body-"

"I can explain that," Dean defended.

"I'd love you hear your excuse." He smiled, letting himself relax completely. He was sure of it now, could feel it in his heart, in his soul. If this thing wasn't Dean, if it was lying, he would know. He had sixth sense about those things now.

"It's a long story. You might want to take a seat."

Sam plopped down on the bed beside his brother, apparently closer than Dean had anticipated, by the look on his stolen face. "What?"

"Nothing. Just been a while since we last cuddled." He smirked. "So, anyway, this kid…"

"How old is he?"

"'Bout nineteen."

"How old _was_ he?"

"Fourteen."

Sam stood up. "Fourteen? You hijacked a teenager?"

Dean shook his head. "There were extenuating circumstances. When the Gate opened up again five years ago, I kinda let myself out, hopped into the first guy I could find. I told his family he was going on a business trip for a couple of days and drove to the closest city. I found a doctor at a childrens' hospital-"

"You were trolling for kids?"

The demon cocked an eyebrow. "Now you're making me sound like Michael Jackson. It wasn't like that. I had a plan. I used the doctor to find a kid. _This_ kid, obviously. He'd been in a car accident when he was twelve. Hit by a drunk driver. Tyler here had been brain-dead ever since, folks playing God and keeping him alive like he was some sort of Frankenstein's monster."

"So…?"

"So the lights were on, but nobody was home. Hell, the lights weren't even _supposed_ to be on."

"So, what, you just hopped right in and hit the road?"

Dean nodded. "Pretty much. Had the pretty doctor cover for me."

"She trusted a demon?"

"Different times, Sammy. The war'd been raging for a while, and some people were starting to take notice. She just happened to be one. Guess she figured out I was a good guy."

Sam sat back down, looking at his brother with hard eyes. "So it's just you in there?"

"Kid's long gone, yeah."

"And you're really…?"

He smiled, a sad smile, so small that Sam barely even saw it. "A demon? More or less. I'm a newbie. Too weak to do anything worthwhile by most standards."

"You read my mind."

"And I burst a blood vessel in the kid's brain. Not that it matters."

Sammy shook his head and let out a small chuckle, the first since his brother's death. "What happened, Dean? Everything's so… _different_. I mean, there's gotta be a reason for it."

"Like I said, long story. Remember how killing that yellow-eyed son of a bitch left the door open for Lily to step up and try her hand at killing you?"

"Yeah," Sam said, a ghost of a smile forming across his face as he turned back to his brother, "why?"

"Well, when you killed her, you left it open for something even worse to step up. I mean, we're talking something smart and expertly trained and totally indifferent to everyone and everything."

"And it opened the Gate?"

"Well, it tried its hand at hunting first. Went after anything and anyone that might stand in its way. A lot of god people were lost. And this thing had some pretty deep ties to Hell. It didn't want to, so it decided to break 'em."

"How'd it do that?"

"It built up an army. Any demon that would follow it. The ones that didn't got themselves killed. And it went after more hunters, a few civilians. It killed Ben's mom when he was about fifteen. Killed Ellen and Bobby. Killed Tamara. And that guy Creedy that tried to kill you in Black rock. Got 'em all."

Sam shook his head. "That doesn't make sense. If it was trying to break away from Hell-"

"It didn't break away. It broke in. Opened up a Gate and marched right in. Started recruiting. It killed a lot of demons that day, but it beefed up its army so much that nothing could stop it."

"And that's when you got out?"

Dean nodded. "Yep. Five years ago, I barely snuck by. I saw the thing, though, and it scared me. It was so cold, so different than I'd thought. I mean, we heard rumors, in the pit, about what was going on up top, but I never imagined…"

"So this thing breaks out an army of demons, how does that help it?"

"It doesn't. It kinda lost its purpose. Forgot what it was going into Hell for. Power corrupts, and this thing got a lot of it fast. It just took over from there. Really hostile. Some people died. Most were possessed. It's a brave new world out there, with demons walking around like they own the place."

Sam sighed, looking back down at his hands. "What about you? You seem fine."

Dean just shrugged. "Twenty years in the pit isn't enough to forget who you are. And I slipped by. Black eyes are like a get-outta-jail-free card now. A few of us are trying to fight it, but it's just not enough."

"What if I fought it?" He looked back up at his brother. "What if I go back and-"

Dean shook his head. "Not gonna work. It destroyed everything that could destroy it. No Colt. No knife. No time travel."

"But what if we found a way? I could go back and kill it in the past, stop this from happening."

"I don't think you want to do that."

"Why not? Dean, this isn't a future, this is Hell on Earth. If I can stop it-"

"You can't kill it."

"Sure I can. Just tell me what it is, and where to find it. I can stop this from ever happening. I can save the world. Dean, I can kill it."

"No, Sam. You can't."

"Why not?"

Dean sighed, dropping his gaze to the floor. "Because it's you."


	5. I Dare You To Move

Ha ha! I'm back after that evil cliffie and job hunting! So, how's Sammy gonna take the news?

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_Chapter 5_

_I Dare You To Move_

He could hear Dean pacing, crossing the floor, waiting for him to come to terms with everything. But that was impossible. How could he possibly digest all of that? Not only had he hopped forward nearly twenty years when he was shooting to go back three or four, but his brother had broken himself out of Hell, and- oh yeah- here was the kicker: Sammy Winchester, Demon Hunter Extraordinaire, had taken over the world with an army of demons he'd let out of Hell. Just like ole Yeddy always wanted.

"That's impossible," he muttered for what had to be the hundredth time since meeting up with his brother again.

"You know, you keep saying that," Dean said, pulling back the tattered curtains and peering out the window, "but it doesn't change anything."

"I couldn't have done that."

Dean turned to him and frowned, and for an instant, Sam could see his brother shining through the stolen meat suit, could see the man that he'd lost. "If it makes you feel any better, it wasn't your fault. If I hadn't left-"

"You would have wound up in Hell anyway, Dean. That's what happens when people kill themselves."

The older man smirked. "Look who's the mind reader now."

Sam shook his head. "How could I let this happen?"

"I told you, it wasn't your fault." The demon crossed the room and sat back down on the bed, placing a cautious hand on his brother's shoulder. "Nobody saw this coming. Nobody could have. But it's all right. Not your fault. We're thinking it's fixable."

"I unleashed the armies of Hell onto Earth. How is that fixable?"

Dean opened his mouth to reply, but stopped. He cocked his head to one side, as if listening. Without saying a word, he stood and stalked back to the window, brushing the curtains aside enough to see out of them. "Dammit."

"What?"

The older man turned back to him. "Look, I know you're freaking out about all this, and you have a right to, but we need to have this talk later."

"Why?"

"Because they found us."

Sam stood up. "Who found us?"

"Demons. We need to go." He reached under the table and pulled out a battered backpack.

"If they're demons, couldn't I just-?"

"They can't know you're here," Dean said, grabbing his brother's arm and pulling him away from the door. "Come on."

"I thought you could pass for one of them."

"Let's just say a select few have this handsome mug committed to memory." They walked into the run-down bathroom, where Dean knocked out what remained of the glass on the small window. "Think you can fit?"

Sam eyed the window and nodded. They both slid through unharmed and emerged into a back alleyway. "Where are we going?"

"We need to find a manhole," the demon replied as he started off through the darkened alley.

"Any reason?"

Dean smiled. "Now that we've gotten the past twenty years established, I figure it's time for you to meet the troops."

"The troops live in a sewer?"

The older man glared at him, pushing a finger to his stolen lips as they neared the end of the alley. He peeked out onto the desolate landscape, his eyes roving over the barren earth, searching for whatever he'd seen and heard back in the room. He looked back at Sam and nodded, giving the all-clear.

Slowly, they moved from their hiding place. As Sam stepped out of the sheltered alley and back into what the world had become since Dean had died, he shuddered. This was what he was going to do, this was his destiny, set in stone since his infancy. This was all he could aspire to.

He followed Dean down a cracked sidewalk, watching the older man walk, the familiar swagger that seemed so out-of-place on the young boy his brother was inhabiting. Dean had once told him that destiny was a load of bull, that a man could choose his own fate. Sam hoped he was right. If he was, then Sam could fix it, could fix everything.

He smiled to himself. Yeah. He could fix it. He had found his brother, and together, they would fix everything. They could save the world.

And then he heard the angry shout, turned to see a woman standing on the sidewalk behind them. A man joined her, and he recognized them as the couple he'd seen walking with the hellhound. The couple was running after them in an instant, racing down the sidewalk.

Dean reached back and grabbed his brother's arm, moving his open palm in an arc toward the advancing demons as he turned. To both brothers' surprise, their attackers promptly stopped running and flew backward through the air, landing hard on the uneven cement.

Sam and Dean met each other's eyes for a brief moment before taking off back down the sidewalk, running as fast as they could.

Old shoes pounded against crumbling pavement as the boys ran, eyes scanning the streets for signs of entrance into the sewer systems. Finally, Dean caught sight of a manhole and rushed into the middle of the road. He dropped to his knees as Sam stopped beside him. Together, they hefted the heavy cover from the hole, revealing a rusting ladder that led to the depths of the earth.

Dean glanced back over his shoulder to see that the demons were long gone before dropping down into the hole. He looked back up and grinned at Sam. "Come on in, Sammy. The water's fine."

Rolling is eyes at the remark, the likes of which he'd missed over the years, Sam lowered himself into the sewer. His shoes splashed down in shallow, brown water and he cringed. "This is disgusting."

Dean shrugged. "Hey, all the Extreme World Make-Over crap you pulled up top, you'd think you could have tidied up down here, too."

Sam glared at him. "That isn't funny. Why didn't you stop me?"

"What do you mean?"

"You could have killed me, Dean. You could have stopped me."

Dean shook his head and started off through the sewer, kicking up stinking water as he went. "Come on, Sammy. You know me. I couldn't do that."

"You have to do something. You could have at least tried.

"And I did," Dean said, whirling around to face the taller man. "I had a plan."

"Yeah? And what was that?"

"I was gonna get up inside you."

Sam blinked. "Eew."

"I figured that you were still in there somewhere, that I could get through. I thought if I hopped in, I could remind you of who you were. I thought I could make you remember."

"Why didn't you?"

Dean sighed, stepping toward his brother and grabbing the collar of the younger man's shirt. He yanked the fabric down far enough to expose the tattooed pentagram that stood out stark against Sam's tanned skin. "That's why. I'd need to break the Trap, but I can't get close enough to you to do it." He let go of Sam's shirt and stepped away, turning back to gaze down the dark sewer tunnel. "Sorry."

Sam glanced down at his stretched out shirt before looking back at Dean and following the older man through the tunnel. "So, where are we going?"

"To rally the troops."

"_My_ troops?"

"No, dumbass. The two lovebirds we just met were yours. I'm talking about ours."

"_Ours_?"

Dean turned and grinned. "You didn't really think we'd let you get away with all this without a fight, did you?"

"What are you talking about?" Sam asked, although he had a pretty good idea. He smiled. If someone was fighting, it meant that there was hope, and hope meant that he could fight it, take destiny head-on and win.

And he realized for the first time since waking up that he was different. Different than he'd been earlier that day, when he'd killed Bela, stabbed her in the back in a sick imitation of the action that had damned himself and his brother. He was different now, better, _human_. He liked the feeling.

He followed Dean through the tunnels, followed him through the darkness, followed him blindly, just as he always had, and now always would.


	6. Welcome To Resistance

All right. There was a Dark Angel marathon on today, I barely got out of more job hunting, and this is a long chapter. So, fun! Please enjoy, and thanks for reading and reviewing so far, guys. _

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_Chapter 6_

_Welcome To Resistance_

"So, what was that back there?"

Dean turned and raised an eyebrow. "What was what?"

"You tossed those demons through the air like there were nothing. You do that often?"

The older man smirked. "Actually, that was the first time. Never worked before."

"You've tried to do it before?"

"Yeah. Wouldn't you?"

"No," Sam said, "I wouldn't. You know why? Because _demons_ fight with TK."

Dean turned back around, flashing his brother a black-eyed gaze. "And your point is?"

"My point is that you're better than this, Dean. The brother I knew never would have given into darkness like that."

"It's not giving into darkness. It's taking advantage of what you've got and using it to fight."

Sam shook his head, unable to believe what he was hearing, hoping that he was picking up some kind of interference from the sloshing of his shoes through the muck. "You're kidding me, right?"

"Not like I have much of a choice unless I want to get my ass handed to me. Came in real handy back there, in case you missed it."

"But you're fighting like one of _them_."

"Newsflash, Sammy-"

"You're not. You can't be."

"If it looks like a demon and fights like a demon-"

"Then why haven't you tried to kill me? Huh? Demons kill people like me. But you won't."

Dean grinned. "Are we still playing the 'role-reversal' card? Honestly, man, I thought we'd moved past that."

"How could you let yourself sink in so low?"

The older man shrugged as he hopped up onto a platform, shaking loose water from his pants and shoes before slinking along the wall, glancing back to make sure Sam was still following him. "Sometimes you don't have a choice, all right? Sometimes it's kill or be kill. Like I said, it's a brave new world, and everyone had to adapt pretty damn fast. It's war, Sam, and you fight with all you've got."

"Is that what I did?"

Dean didn't answer, didn't even look at him, and for the first time since getting dropped into the future, Sam began to doubt his brother's motives. He was still positive that it was Dean, positive in the way that a blind man is positive that he knows the number of steps it takes to get from one room to the other. It was a gut feeling, an instinct honed over a lifetime, a sensation that he'd missed almost as much as he'd missed his own care of the world and everything in it. Both had disappeared with his brother's death.

He looked at the man he was following, realizing for what seemed to be the first time that Dean had a point. If he looked like a demon and fought like a demon, then what did that make him? It made him something they'd always hunted, something that had killed their mother, something that had taken Dean's soul and Sam's humanity, something that lied to him, strung him along, and then begged for mercy.

And there was something he was hiding. Not in the big 'mom-knew-the-demon' sense, but in a smaller 'I-took-the-cookie-from-the-cookie-jar' way. Maybe it was nothing. Maybe it wasn't important. Maybe Sam was imagining things.

But maybe he wasn't.

Dean stopped beside a large metal hatch that had been positioned at the wall. It looked rusted shut, impenetrable. He knocked twice, the clanging sound echoing through the tunnels. He looked back at Sam and flashed a smile so familiar and warm that the younger man couldn't help but forget any doubts. Secrets were ok. Secrets didn't kill. Everyone deserved to have a few.

Dean turned back to the door. "Come on," he said, his voice rising slightly above the normal level. "You know I can't say it."

Sam watched as a small metal panel slid back from the hatch to reveal a set of mistrusting eyes. The eyes roved over the brothers, settling on Sam. Finally, a voice spoke from behind the door. "Christo."

Dean flinched, his eyes turning black as the appraising gaze watched. A smile appeared in the eyes behind the door and the stare softened. "Sorry man. SOP."

"No problem, Matt," Dean replied as his eyes slid back to brown.

"Who's the new guy?" Matt asked, an edge in his gruff voice.

"Survivor. Found him hanging around up top. Convinced him to come down here."

The hatch opened to reveal Matt's entire body, a short but well-built figure. "He hurt?"

"Fine and dandy."

"Shame," Matt said. "We got three new escapees in while you were out waltzing around."

"I was doing my job," Dean clarified as he stepped into the room that sprawled out beyond Matt. He motioned for Sam to follow. "Without me, we wouldn't have half the intel we do."

"Come off it, Dean," Matt chided, closing and locking the door as soon as Sam had passed through. "We all know you got the cushiest job."

Dean just shrugged and moved past the doorman, into the room. Sam's eyes widened as he looked around. They definitely weren't in the sewer anymore. The place more like a poorly decorated palace than home to the rats of the world. It was a wide expanse made of fortified stone and filled to the brim with tables, chairs, cots, and people.

As Sam followed his brother farther into the room, he could see little alcoves set off into the walls, some housing people laid out on cots getting stitched up, some housing people who had been injured beyond repair. Latin chanting could be heard from another, one that Dean tried hard to avoid, though he still wound up twitching a bit as they passed it.

"Where are we?" Sam asked as he gazed around the room, looking at the tired people sitting in chairs, laying on cots, talking and cleaning weapons and sleeping.

"Resistance HQ," Dean answered with a grin.

"All of these people are hunters?"

Dean tipped a wave to someone who was sitting at a back table, looking over a crumpled mess of papers. "Nope. Not for the past three years. Our breed's dying out. We can't train 'em fast enough to replace."

"What do you mean?"

The demon stopped and turned, looking Sam straight in the eyes. "You sure you want to know?"

"I think I have right to, now that I'm here."

"All right, well, the truth is, you went after hunters first. The more experienced, the quicker you killed them. A couple got away, joined up. For the most part, though, they were extinct."

"But all of these people-"

"First off, they're not all technically people."

"You know what I mean."

Dean shrugged. "We find stragglers all the time. People who managed to hold out by hiding in old hunting cabins, storm cellars, whatever. Sometimes they're in big groups, sometimes it's just one or two. We don't turn 'em down. We can't."

"But you can't train 'em, either."

"Sometimes we do. We've got a camp. It's run by one of our best hunters, but it's not enough. You can't really prepare people for this crap."

"So what do you do?" Sam asked.

Dean dropped his gaze. "Sometimes those groups we get in are hurt. They come out into the open to try and find help. Mostly, it they're desperate enough to come out of hiding, it's bad."

"So something possesses them?"

"It's not like that. We offer a choice. The host will heal faster and live longer if something's keeping him alive. It gets pretty symbiotic."

"How many demons have you got?"

Dean sighed, looking back up at Sam. "More than you'd think. The ones that didn't join you came here. And they keep bustin' outta Hell, thinking this'll be better. But it's not. Some even try to go back. Like it's a freakin' _paradise_ or something. We take in the ones who don't or can't."

"And that's why your guard wanted to know if I was hurt? He thought I might play meat puppet for something?"

"I'll let you in on a little secret," Dean said, turning back around and making his way through the crowd as he spoke. "The things you find here aren't like the ones we fought. They've been beaten and bruised and watched the world go to Hell. If they liked it that way, they'd be with you. If they don't, they come here."

Sam nodded, trying to take it in, to take in the fact that everything he'd known had changed in an instant and Dean was right. The world had gone to Hell. "What all do you have fighting for you?"

The older man grinned. "That's better. Like I said, you can mope about all this later. Right now we have to figure out what's going on."

"What are all these things?" Sam repeated, refusing to be brushed off.

"Got a few hunters," Dean said, "a few demons. A pack of werewolves and a nest of vamps. We've got our own coven. A couple of shape-shifters. Even a ghost or two. A few psychics. Used to have a trickster, but you got the better of him."

"And all of those things live here together without killing each other?"

"Don't get me wrong, it was pretty strained at first. But, uh, now that we've figured out that we're all on the same side, it's smooth sailing."

Sam nodded, watching the people- the _things-_ that they passed as they made their way farther back into the vast chamber. He found that he could pick them out, the witches from the vampires from the werewolves. They all sat together, mingled, but there were signs. The witches had deep gashes along their hands and arms from spells, the werewolves looked haggard and tended to shy from anything silver, and the vampires had apparently just finished feeding.

"What do they eat?"

Dean glanced over his shoulder at his brother. "What?"

"The vamps. What do they eat?"

"Used to be cattle. Then the other side started patrolling the farms. They scavenge now, mostly. If someone's beyond repair and there isn't any new hellspawn to take the body, they either feast or turn the person." He looked back again. "It's all left up to the three-course meal, naturally."

"Of course," Sam muttered, letting his eyes travel back across the room. "What about the demons that don't have hosts? What do you do with them?"

"Find 'em hosts," Dean grinned, nodding toward the floor. Sam followed his gaze to see a pair of dogs with coal-black eyes staring up at him. "Relax, guys," Dean told them, "he's not up for grabs." The dogs hung their heads and slowly turned away.

Sam watched the dogs walk off before turning back to his brother. Was this really what those demonic entities that his family had been trained to fight become? Whimpering puppies waiting for suitable hosts? In another time, it would have seemed too good to be true, if not for the whole end-of-the-world thing.

All throughout the room, people were mumbling hellos and waving to Dean, nodding their heads, or smiling. "You're pretty popular," Sam observed.

Dean just shrugged. "When you've been here as long as I have, you make some friends." He stopped at a table housing a group of heavily-scarred fighters. "Hey, guys. What's up?"

"Nothing much," a young blond said, shrugging his shoulders, "just waiting for mom to get back."

Dean nodded. "Well, you hear from her, you tell her to hurry, ok, Will? Something big's going down."

The man's eyes sparked to life. "How big?"

"Like, end-of-the-world big," an older woman at the table said with a slight smirk on her face. The blond deflated immediately.

"Hey, even if it was that big," another man said, "your mom would never let you fight. You know how overprotective she can get."

Will sighed and nodded. "Yeah. Man, I never get to have any fun."

"Consider yourself lucky," Dean said, "I got chased by demons today."

The other man from the table looked up at him. "Didn't lead 'em here, did you?"

"'Course not. You know me better than that."

"You never know. There might be traitor among us." He stood up, stepping away from the table, and grinned. "So, who's the new guy?"

"Sammy," Dean said. "Ironic, huh, Marc?"

The man eyed Sam nervously. "He looks familiar."

"Maybe you've seen him before. He's been out there for a while." He stepped closer to the man, dropping his voice. "So, I heard you were heading out today?"

"Yep. Got reports of a band of survivors up in the Rockies. Boss is sending me out. Leaving tonight."

"Did you, uh, think about what I said?"

Marc sighed, dropping his eyes. "Hey, man. I've told you once, I've told you a thousand times. If I'm gonna die trying to take down your evil-ass little brother, I'm at least gonna die a free man. All right?"

Dean nodded, a shadow of a frown crossing his face. "Yeah. Be careful out there tonight, ok?"

"Sure thing, Dean." Marc sat back down and continued his conversation with the other people at the table.

"What was that about?" Sam asked.

"Nothing," Dean replied, turning and continuing across the vast expanse of the room. "Come on."

"Where we going?"

"Gonna take you to meet the founder."

"The founder?" Sam asked.

"Yeah. The first person who realized something was up. She blew the whistle to every hunter she could find, but none of them believed her. In hindsight, it sure was a shame ole Gordy had to go when he did. He might have believed her, and he had enough clout that he would have been a great recruiter. Probably could have saved a lot of people."

"You're siding with Gordon now?"

"No," Dean said, "he was certifiable. I'm just saying that he might have come in handy, prevented a whole lotta mess." He turned down a narrow hall that led back to a wooden door and knocked. "It's me."

The door opened slowly to reveal an empty room. Sam glanced over at his brother, confused, to see that Dean was looking down at something. Sam followed his gaze and gasped.

"Glad to see you finally made it," the woman in the wheelchair said, her clear British accent ringing through the stone hall. "I was starting to wonder if you'd actually used that sundial or just destroyed it."

"_Bela_?" He barely managed to croak out.

She smiled. "In the flesh. Bit of advice, sweetheart. Next time you try to kill someone, make damn sure you finish the job."


	7. What Happens Next?

Heehee. I'm glad that people are liking this one. I thought that, since I enjoyed writing it, no one would like reading it! Oh, and I'm not sure if anyone's noticed, but all of the chapter titles are lines from the Switchfoot song "I Dare You To Move."

So, just how did Bela survive Sam's attempt on her life? Why, exactly, did Sammy go forward? Is this story gonna be like LOST and ask questions without answering them? :P

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_Chapter 7_

_What Happens Next?_

Sam stared at the woman across the table, at the subtle wrinkles carving shallow paths along her pale face, the graying streaks in her hair, the eyes that burned toward him. He had killed her. He had been sure of it. He'd felt her blood on his hands, had watched the light die from her eyes, had stood over her, just staring, savoring the moment.

Dean had thought she was dead. He had left her for dead, gotten rid of the problem so that Sam wouldn't have to deal with her. When Sammy had found out that she'd escaped and might have something that he needed, he went to her. He went to her, he got what he wanted, and he finished what his brother had started. He avenged his older sibling, the sibling that might never have traveled all the way down south if a certain antique gun had never been stolen from them.

And he was positive he had finished the job.

"Ok," Dean said slowly, speaking up for the first time since entering Bela's spacious office and sitting at the large table that occupied most of the room, "awkward." He looked at them both, glancing between them, attackee and attacker.

"Why'd you do it, Sam?" Bela finally asked. "Was getting that trinket really _that_ important to you?" He didn't answer, just stared her drown, trying to figure out what had gone wrong. He'd done exactly what Jake had nearly three years before. He'd thought that he'd severed her spinal cord, a quick death, but a painful one, nonetheless. He knew that much for sure.

"Maybe we should talk about something else," Dean suggested. "Like how to get him back."

She smiled. "Yes. Because he obviously isn't where he wanted to end up, is he? Tell me, Sammy, when, _exactly_, were you shooting for? How far did you miss the mark?"

"That's none of your business," he said, finally speaking, his voice so full of acid that Dean actually flinched at the words.

"I think it's very much my business. Just tell me."

He narrowed his eyes at her. "Why should I?"

She stared at him with a level gaze, her voice calm, tone amiable enough. "Because you're the one who did _this_," she gestured toward her now-useless legs, "to me. And I want to know why."

"You want to know why?" he asked, leaning forward, barely even noticing as Dean tensed in his seat, readying for a fight, "you really want to know?"

"It's always been a mystery to me, so, yes. I would."

"It's because you killed my brother. It's because you stole the only thing that could kill the thing that took him. You gave us up, Bela. You sold us out. You stole it and you sold us and he died. And when I found out that you weren't as dead as we'd thought, I guess I just snapped a little." He lowered himself back into his seat, leaning back and gazing at her. "My bad."

He could feel their eyes on him, watching him, but he didn't care. He just kept staring at her, hating her. He hated her because of what she had done, because she had lived, because she was holding this against him, something she'd brought upon herself. He hated the way she was making him feel, the way that unflinching gaze bored into him, hitting him where it hurt.

He swallowed hard. He felt bad. He couldn't explain the sudden wave of guilt, of remorse, of sorrow. He couldn't explain why he was feeling it now, twenty years too late. He couldn't explain how he had been able to stand over her body and feel nothing but the warmth of her blood on his hands, couldn't explain why his horrible act had suddenly caught up to him.

But he could explain _why_ it was horrible. He could explain it now and he knew why. He looked at his brother, saw something in the older man's stolen eyes, a glance directed at Bela. Sam wasn't a mind reader, but he knew what that gaze meant. It meant that he'd crossed the line, that he was different.

He _was_ different, but not in the way that they were obviously thinking, not in the 'too-far-gone' sense. It had been a fleeting realization at first, the bubbling of hope within his chest, the shock of what he'd done since losing Dean, the confusion and fear, and now this. He was feeling again, letting himself be human, and it was good. It _felt_ good. He hadn't felt good in a long time.

He opened his mouth, unaware of what was coming, what he was going to say, but that nagging hole in his chest, the burning of guilt and remorse and fear, just wouldn't quiet until he did something. Until he _said_ something. "I'm sorry."

Two heads whipped toward him, two sets of eyes targeting him, honing in on him, like lasers trying to find a sniper's mark. "What?" Bela asked.

"I said… I'm sorry. For what I did. I know it doesn't make a difference now, but… I'm sorry."

Dean smiled and turned back to Bela, and Sam read what he was saying without words loud and clear. _I told you so._

She sighed, her shoulders slumping, seeing Dean's logic in Sam's words. "All right. I can't say I forgive you, but… when were you trying to go?"

Sam shrugged. "I dunno. Not exactly. I was thinking back to Cold Oak." He looked at Dean. "I figured if I could keep Jake from, you know, then maybe you wouldn't have to, _you know_."

Dean nodded. "Makes sense. So how'd you wind up here?"

"I have no idea. I found the ritual in a book that I found at Jim's old cabin. I followed it exactly-"

"To the letter?" Bela asked.

"Yeah."

"Describe it."

He ducked his head, suddenly ashamed. He'd done some things that he now wasn't proud of in order to get his brother back, things that had seemed to be worth it before, back when he was alone. Now that he was with other people, with _family_, it was like he was coming out of a fog. Looking back into the ever-darkening mass of the past two years scared him. He wasn't liking what he saw.

"I built the altar," he said, hoping to avoid details, "I used everything it said to. The sundial was the last thing I needed."

"What about the virgin?"

Sam cleared his throat, physically turning away from his brother. "Yeah. Got her first."

"And you're sure-?"

"I'm positive, Bela."

She leaned back in her chair, her gaze never faltering, pinning him there across from her. He couldn't remember seeing that intensity in her gaze before, but he supposed that hiding in a sewer for nearly twenty years was apt to do things to the way a person viewed the world.

"And the incantation?"

"Memorized it. Said it perfectly."

"What about the last part?"

He glanced up at her. "What do you mean?"

"The ritual was designed to find a _person_ in time, not necessarily an event. If you wanted to stop yourself from getting murdered, you should have visualized the murderer, or one of the other psychics that got dropped in Cold Oak."

"I never read anything about that."

She leaned forward again, leaning her elbows against the old wooden table. "Tell me what you thought about."

Sam shrugged. "Dean. Just Dean."

"You focused on him?"

"Yeah."

"You visualized him?"

"Yeah."

"How?"

"What?" Sam asked, shaking his head slightly.

"How did you see him? What did you see? I need you to think back, because if you truly did everything right, then there's only one way you messed up. Tell me what you saw."

He stared at her for a minute, then turned to his brother. Dean had been silent for most of the meeting, letting Bela talk, letting her _lead_. That was what she did now. She solved the problems, made the plans. She helped. He sighed.

"I saw him the way he was," Sam said. "Just like he'd always been." He closed his eyes, trying to remember if anything else had popped up in his mind's eye, if something could have gone terribly wrong. He closed his eyes and he saw his brother, all happy smiles and shining eyes and annoying habits.

The eyes that he saw blinked, and ceased being so bright, so colorful. They were black as a starless sky, black as oil, black as a demon's soul.

Sam's eyes snapped open.

"What?" Dean asked, concerned to the very end, playing the part he'd always played. "What is it?"

Bela narrowed her eyes and grinned. "You found it, didn't you?"

Slowly, Sam nodded. "Yeah. I remember… it happens a lot when I try to, you know," he looked back at his brother, "think of you. It's like I see what I want to at first, but then it changes to, well, _this_."

"This?" Dean asked. "You mean…?"

"Black eyes." Sam looked back at Bela. "That's what did it, right? I saw a demon."

She glanced at Dean before nodding slowly. "Most likely."

Sam sighed, letting his shoulders slump as he leaned farther back into the chair, pushing his long legs out beneath the table. "Great. Now what?"

"Now," Dean said, "we wait."

The younger man raised an eyebrow. "For what?"

As soon as the words had left his mouth, the door leading into the office opened to reveal a petite woman with shortly cropped blonde hair and a hardened face. She glanced over at the table where the trio sat, her gaze settling on Sam and darkening. Before he could react, she'd started running, diving across the table to ram into him, knocking the startled hunter to the floor. The business end of a pistol was shoved into the hollow where his neck met his chin, jutting in hard as she leered down at him.

"'Bout time you found us, _freakshow_," she hissed, cocking the weapon and preparing to literally blow his head off.


	8. Everybody Waits For You Now

I'll be honest. The blonde chick wasn't supposed to be in this story. But then I thougt about it, and turned down the idea, and thought about it some more, and then i said "What the Hell?" and here she is. Please jsut hear her out before _tuning_ out!_

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_Chapter 8_

_Everybody Waits For You Now_

The pressure of the body left Sam's chest before the trigger could be pulled. He gasped and looked around, searching for the woman that had attacked him. He scrambled to a sitting position to see Dean standing up, his chair toppled over at his feet, staring at the wall. Bela was staring at Dean, but her eyes flickered to the same spot that the demon's rested on, as if she wasn't sure which was more interesting. Sam decided to follow his brother's gaze.

The blonde had been pinned to the wall in true demonic fashion, her arms thrown out to either side of her body, legs dangling weakly, head lolling limply against the cracked plaster. Now that she was being held stationary, there was something familiar about her, the desperate look in her eyes, the set of her lips against her teeth as she snarled at them.

"I told you!" the woman yelled, "he's one of _them_. A traitor. He led that _thing _down here."

Bela ignored her, keeping her gaze fixed on Dean. "How long?"

Dean kept his eyes narrowed, glaring at the woman on the wall, blood slowly trickling from his nose, down to his parted lips, into his stolen mouth. "How long, what?"

"How _long_, Dean. Since when have you been able to do that?"

The blonde kept yelling, apparently hoping to attract attention. "_Hellspawn_. I told you they'd compromise him, and I was right. His kind can't be trusted. His family's an evil breed."

Dean shrugged, ignoring the pinned woman. "About twenty minutes now."

"If it fights like a demon," the blonde shouted, "then it can't be trusted. I _told _you."

"Yes, Jo," Dean deadpanned, swiping a hand across his face and cringing at the blood on it, "we know. You told us."

Sam felt his eyes widen as recognition dawned on him. Yeah, he could see it now, the shape of the face, the large eyes, the pout. She'd cut her hair, had aged more than he would have expected, but it was her. "_Jo_?"

Her head whipped around as much as her current position would allow. "_Satan_."

Sam scooted himself up off the floor, struggling to stand. "Jo Harvelle?" He looked to his brother for confirmation.

"Unfortunately," Dean stated dryly. "Hey, blondie." Her head whipped back around toward the demon, her eyes narrowed to dark slits. "Take a good look at Beelzebub here before you start throwing accusations, ok? Tell me what you see."

That uncomfortably dark gaze was on him again, boring into him, making him squirm. Jo slid down the wall, her eyes softening as Dean lost whatever weak hold he'd had on her.

"I see," she said slowly, as if she couldn't believe her eyes, "I don't believe what I see. He looks-"

"Different?" Dean offered.

Jo nodded. "Like he used to." Those familiar, large eyes turned to Dean as her feet hit the floor and the demon's knees buckled, sending him to the floor. Sam was quick to help him up, looping an arm around his brother and resetting his toppled chair with a grunt. "What did you do?"

Dean swiped another hand across his face, trying to clear it of blood. "I didn't do anything."

The blonde slid into the seat across the table from Dean, still staring with wide eyes, as Sam took his own seat. "Then what happened?"

"Time travel," Bela offered, "an ancient ritual. It went a little wrong."

"I can tell." She looked over at Sam, appraising him, and in her eyes he could see why he hadn't recognized her at first, could tell what that one big difference in her was. She had hardened. A hunter sat beside him now, not a little girl wanting to play with daddy's guns, but an actual _hunter_. Someone who had seen and done unforgivable, nightmare things. It had changed her.

"So," Dean muttered, breaking up an awkward silence as the flow of blood from his nose finally slowed, "we were, uh, waiting for you. Any reason for the delay?"

"Our site training got a little interrupted," she said slowly, her eyes cast downward.

"How interrupted?" Bela asked.

"We lost Eric, Sarah, Jeremy, Ben, and Raelle. It was an ambush, and we just weren't ready."

"What about the others?"

Jo shrugged. "Luke and Kyle made it. So did Maggie, but she's bad off. I think Justine's in there talking to her, trying to work out a deal. Maggie's soft enough and hurt enough to cave."

Dean nodded, wiping at his nose again and coming up clean. "Yeah, well, we all knew she couldn't cut it out there. Maybe she'll be better off with Justine. I mean, if the chick could last through most of World War Three with barely a mark on her-"

"Besides the big black one on her soul, you mean?"

"Baby, we're all goin' to Hell," Dean quipped, "might as well have some fun along the way."

"Killing kids isn't fun," Jo argued.

"It is if they're not really kids and they tried to kill you first. It was a mercy killing. She freed them."

"Apparently _Someone_ didn't see it that way."

Dean glared at her over the table, his eyes flashing deadly black before Bela cleared her throat, calming the coming riot.

"Let's get down to business now that we're all here, shall we?"

Jo leaned back in her chair, her eyes still trained on Dean, her body still tensed and ready for battle. "Yeah. Will said you told him something big's going down. What and when?"

"Dean scored us some intel on the other side-"

"You told him that?" She was back on the edge of her seat in an instant, her whole form rigid, muscles bunched in anticipation, looking nothing at all like the girl Sam had once known.

"How stupid do you think I am?" Dean asked. "No, I didn't tell your precious bundle of joy about what's going down. I just figured that we all needed to have this nice, civilized chat, and he was the quickest way to get to you."

"She has a son?" Sam blurted, making his presence truly known for the first time since Jo had attacked him.

Three sets of eyes were trained on him. "For the past twenty years, yeah," the blonde said, her voice cold, "but I don't see why you'd care. It's none of your business."

"Cut the kid a break," Dean said, "and think about how you'd feel waking up twenty years from now."

"I wouldn't be stupid enough to spin a spell I knew nothing about in the first place, so it's irrelevant."

Bela cleared her throat again, plunging the room into another strained silence. "Kids, please, don't make me separate you. We need to make a decision. Dean, what did you find out?"

The demon sighed, leaning forward and resting his elbows on the table. He looked over at Sam. "I've been working as kind of a spy," he explained, "watching the settlement in Cold Oak. It's the main one, as far as we can tell. Used as a training ground." He looked back at Bela. "They know we're the ones who blew up their weapons stores. They got Andrea and Lucas."

Bela nodded. "I know."

"And we still haven't been able to find Kat and Haley."

"Don't remind us," Jo moaned.

"So where are they? People don't just disappear."

"They do when they're possessed."

Dean turned his gaze to the blonde. "Why, though? I mean, their side knows about us, they know we're fighting, they just haven't been able to find us yet."

"We're safe here."

"But if they're possessing our people," Sam said, choosing to ignore the look of pure acid that Jo shot his way at the use of the pronoun, "then they should know where we are."

"We're smarter than they think," Bela said. "We've got our own coven, and we got it early on. Every one of our members is protected mentally with the strongest stuff that five generations of witches could come up with. Their bodies may belong to demons now, but their minds are completely sealed off."

"Until now," Dean offered softly. "They've found a way to break the spells and get through. They used Kat and Haley and people that we lost as long as five months ago as guinea pigs. They think they've finally got it. They can get past every defense we put up. They can find us now."

"Why didn't you tell us about this before?"

"They kept it on the DL until they were sure it would work."

"And what is _it_, exactly?" Jo asked.

Dean shrugged. "On that, I'm clueless."

"Could he have finally developed telepathy?"

"If he did, I haven't heard about it. Although with him, it might be strong enough to break through."

"You know what this means, right?" Bela asked, looking between Dean and Jo.

"War," the blonde stated simply, crossing surprisingly well-muscled arms over her chest.

"Maybe not," Dean said, "maybe we can stop this whole thing before it even starts."

"By doing what? Talking about our _feelings_?"

"Just _talking_. I know you don't believe me, but-"

"Damn right I don't believe you. Going in there would be suicide, Dean, and you know it. There's no getting through to something like that."

"If I just had time-"

"There is no time. For all we know, the troops are heading down here as we speak. We need to take action, rally our own troops, and-"

"What, Jo?" Dean demanded, "what are you and your little band of hunters gonna do? I mean, besides go in half-cocked and get yourselves killed. Or worse."

"We're going to fight," she said, leaning forward, glaring daggers across the table, "we're not going to pussy-foot around, hoping to have some intense emotional breakthrough with something that stopped feeling years ago."

"You don't know that," the demon shouted, jumping to his feet, his hands slamming down onto the table.

"I know that he killed my mother," Jo said softly, her voice deadly. And suddenly, Sam knew exactly what they were talking about. It was him. It had always been him. "He killed Bobby." They were deciding his fate, talking about him like he wasn't even there, wasn't sitting between them, wasn't listening in. "He tried to kill Bela."

"He's still in there."

"You know, you say that, but I haven't seen any proof yet."

Dean shook his head. "He's still my brother."

"Yet he was willing to let you rot in Hell."

Sam was up off the chair before he'd even realized that he'd moved. His fists hit the table in a perfect imitation of his brother's, actually shaking the scuffed wood with the force of the blow. "That's not true." They stared at him, eyes wide, as if they'd forgotten that he was even there. "Don't you get it? I'm trying to save him. That's why I'm here. I wouldn't do that."

"Well, you did," Jo said, "noble as your intentions may have been, Sammy, some things just don't work out the way you plan." She turned cold eyes to Bela. "We're attacking tomorrow, right? Before they have a chance to attack us."

The founder of the resistance looked down at the end of the table, at the three people standing there, all begging with their eyes. "Tomorrow," she finally said, "but let's try to give Dean a chance, huh? Maybe we can avoid some bloodshed." With that, she wheeled herself away from the table, toward the door, and out into the main room.

Jo looked at her Dean, her face glowing with pride, a wicked grin darkening what had once been pretty features. "Looks like it's war, then."

Dean matched her grin, his eyes turning dark, making the expression sinister. "Good. I can't wait to jump into the rapidly cooling body of that sweet kid of yours. Tell me, Joey, how long after that until you stop calling me Will?"

"Go to Hell."

"Been and done. Get a new comeback, sweetheart."

Growling low in her throat, Jo turned and stormed off, her heavy footfalls dying away as she slammed the door behind her. Sam swallowed hard, trying not to think about what had just happened, trying to shake the image of black eyes and a sinister smirk, the sound of threats and taunts.

It was Dean, he was sure of it, still as sure as he'd been that morning, but something was different. Everything had changed. Every_one _had changed. Sam was fast learning that twenty years in Hell could be just as bad a sentence as twenty years spent searching for a way in. Maybe even worse.


	9. Where Do You Run To Escape From Yourself

Wow. i come back from a day at the campground to find a bunch of awesome reviews! I'm so spoiled! Thanks, you guys.

On a totally realted note, we're camping! About ten miles from our house. And the campground has no wi-fi. So I'm home or my borther's TaeKwonDo thing, but we'll be leaving again once he gets back. That means there probably won't be any updates until about Monday. Is that ok? Ok. Please enjoy this one!

* * *

_Chapter 9_

_Where Do You Run To Escape From Yourself?_

He was scared. He hadn't felt fear in so long, hadn't felt anything in so long, that he almost welcomed it. He would have preferred happiness, sure, but anything was better than nothing, right?

Sam sighed, staring into the dirty water as it rushed by. He'd left the safety of the resistance HQ, looking to get a little air. He didn't care that it reeked, didn't care that it was sour and stale, just needed to get out.

He'd needed to get away from Dean. He'd needed to think, to avoid Jo's harsh glares, his brother's apologies and encouragements that everything would work out, Bela's accusing gaze. That was the worst, probably because it had just happened that morning, was still so fresh in his mind, stood out starkly against the murders of Ruby and Lilith, two demons who had it coming. He'd tried to kill a person, and she'd survived to live a half-life in a sewer with a hodge-podge army that she had to know didn't stand a chance against something that could decimate the world like he had.

Dirty water rushed past in a little river, eroding the stone sides of the sewer tunnels, the dirt and grime that had settled there, but refusing to touch his sins. He was marked, and even the cleanest of water wouldn't have been able to wash that guilt away.

o0o0o0o0o0o

_The door creaked open as he entered the old house. He wasn't even sure how she'd done it, how she'd managed to live and hide and lie for two years while he searched hopelessly for anything and everything that could help. He wasn't even entirely sure how he'd found her. Everything over the past couple of weeks had been a blur._

_He slid the knife from its place at his side as effortlessly as he would slice it through her flesh. He knew what he was going to do to her, knew how she would suffer, knew the pain that could be inflicted by this one, simple action._

_Through another door, treading softly, and he'd found her. She was up and out of her chair, the book she'd been reading splayed at her feet as soon as he entered the room. She backed away from him, from the soulless glint in his eyes, the numbness of his feelings, the solid knife. "Sam?"_

_Before he was even aware that he'd moved, Sam had slammed her up against the wall. "I wanna know how," he demanded, pressing the steel of the blade against the delicate skin of her neck._

_Bela stared at him with wide eyes, her mouth working soundlessly as she gaped._

_"Tell me how you're alive!" he screamed, spattering her face with flecks of spittle._

_"I'm so sorry," she whispered, her face crumpling as her body went slack in his strong grasp. "I'm so sorry."_

"Tell me!"

_Bela sobbed, fresh tears washing away the drying saliva that had settled on her cheeks. "She told me," the woman gasped, "she told me to do it. She knew you weren't in the room."_

_"Who knew?"_

_"Lilith."_

_Sam glared her, hoping his confusion wasn't as visible as it felt. "What do you mean? You're the one who gave us a name. You're the one who sent us after her."_

_She gazed up at him, her eyes revealing the same kind of pain that he had tried for two years to hide. "She wanted you. Sam, she wanted you dead. She said… she said she'd let me go, let me live, if I gave you to her."_

_He tightened his grip on her, moving the knife to send it deeper into the flesh of her neck, drawing blood. "Why? Why would she do that?"_

_Bela sobbed again. "I told you, she wanted you dead. She said that if I gave you her name, then you'd go looking for her. Either you would be too late and Dean would die, making you," she paused, swallowing hard, "making you vulnerable…"_

_"Or?"_

_"Or you would get there in time to save him, Dean would try to kill her, go against the contract, and you'd die. He'd be easy pickings after that."_

_Sam narrowed his eyes, feeling rage bubbling up through the cracks that simple desperation had put in the wall he'd built around his heart. "You set us up."_

_"Sam, I'm sorry. I-"_

_"You set us up. You lived. He died. You played us."_

_"I had to."_

_He glared at her, his eyes mere slits, burning with what little human emotion he was letting through, what little he had left. "Self-preservation, right?"_

_She slumped down even farther, leaning against him for support, as if her whole body had gone limp. "I'm sorry. You have to understand-"_

_"I understand perfectly," he muttered, "you used us, and a good man died."_

_"I thought-"_

_"Do you at least have it?"_

_She straightened up a bit, her eyes no longer filled with terror and remorse, but curiosity. "Have what?"_

_"The sundial."_

_Bela's head cocked to one side in an imitation of a confused puppy, an imitation of innocence. "It was you?"_

_"Of course it was me. Who else would want it?"_

_She stared at him, much like she had when he had arrived, her eyes flashing between uncertainty and raw fear. "You want to use it bring him back?"_

_"No, I was gonna go for a stroll through fifteenth-century Paris." He glared her. She glared right back, no longer afraid, certain that the man that had burst through her parlor doors was the same one that she'd left for dead so many times, the same on she'd shot once, the same one whose brother she'd let die for her own selfish reasons. She was dead wrong._

_Slowly, Sam eased off of her, backing away, letting the knife fall to his side. Bela slid from the wall with a satisfied smirk. "I've got it all wrapped up and ready for you," she said, turning from him. "And I am sorry."_

_He watched her back as she stepped slowly away, apparently to get the sundial. It was funny, really, the way that she thought he still needed her at this point in the game, after his searching hands had felt the lump in her pocket. He smirked, the light dying from his eyes as he slid smoothly forward and jammed the knife into the small of her back._

_Bela fell to her knees instantly, just as Sam had nearly three years before. He ripped the knife from her spine, her blood slicking his hands, and leaned in close to her. His long fingers wrapped themselves into her hair and he yanked her head roughly back to stare into her dying eyes. "Go to Hell," he whispered, "and say that to_ him._"_

_He shoved her to the floor, enjoying the tinkling of metal jewelry hitting the hardwood, the soft thud of her body, the chokes of dying breath. He bent down, turned her over, stared into dying eyes, and reached into her pocket._

_Sam smiled as he pulled out the small package wrapped in the white handkerchief. He'd found what he was looking for._

o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o

Sam blinked, bringing himself out of his memories as the sound of footsteps approached. He spun around to see Jo rounding the corner, leaving the safety of the hidden room. She stopped when she saw him, her body immediately going into a fighting stance.

"Relax," he sighed, "I'm not in the mood."

She did as she was told, walking up to stand beside him, looking into the shallow, murky waters. "Some place, huh? Nice and safe and smelly."

Sam grinned. "Yeah. Not exactly the kind of place I'd expect Bela to hole up, though."

"Oh, she used to have a house. Big one. It was razed about ten years ago. After that, we all went looking for someplace new, and this is what we found. Those of us that survived."

He nodded, letting a silence fall between them, letting the rushing of the water overtake his senses, threatening to pull him back into his thoughts, his memories, the horrible places that he'd been, things that he'd done.

"Dean told me that I, um, did some things," Sam said, wanting anything but silence, anything but thought, "he said I started by…killing… hunters." From the corner of his eye, he saw her nod. "So, how come you're still here?"

Jo chuckled, but it was a dry sound, lacking in humor or emotion. "I guess you came after me early," she said, "back when you were still human enough to spare children. Will was maybe five when you found me. I can still remember the look on your face when he woke up from his nap and saw," her voice broke and she turned away, "saw that damned knife. You jumped out the sliding glass door and ran."

"I'm so sorry." But he knew from experience that sorry didn't cut it. Bela knew that, too.

"Yeah, well, I should be thankful, I guess. A couple more years, and we would have both been goners."

"How old is he?"

"Who? Will?" Jo grinned. "Gonna be twenty-one this year. Hard to believe, huh?" Her smile faded. "I kinda feel bad for him. He's old enough to remember what things were like before, but too young to really do anything about it. He thinks he's invincible, though."

Sam nodded, unable to stop himself from asking the next question that popped into his mind. "Who's his dad?"

Any semblance of kindness faded from Jo's face, as if a switch had been flipped in her brain. "The Devil," she hissed, "but don't tell him that." She turned on her heels and stalked back around the corner toward the door.

Sam stared after her in shock. He wasn't entirely sure what he had been expecting, but it sure hadn't been that. In fact, he wasn't even sure what that had meant, just knew that it was cryptic and somehow the most disturbing part of his little time trip to date.

He turned back toward the water, the ebb and flow of the waves up against the side of the little sidewalk that he found himself on. He didn't have time to think about that now, had no time for Jo or her son. He had to figure out what had gone wrong, what had made him do what he'd done, where he'd turned into a monster.

Unfortunately, his brain was working with an information overload, and he couldn't quite seem to focus, couldn't seem to shake the feeling that something was off about Jo's remark, that something was eerily familiar about her son.

"She told him his dad was a hunter," a voice said behind him.

Sam jumped, nearly falling into the murky sewage, and turned to face his brother. "Dean? What the Hell?"

"Sorry," the older man said, shrugging, "couldn't help but overhear."

"No problem. So, what about her son?"

Dean joined him by the edge of the water, staring down into it, and sighed. "He's Luke Skywalker. She told him his dad was a hunter, one of the best. Said he was the first casualty of war, which is true, I guess."

Sam nodded, taking that in, trying to wade through the mess that his mind was in to find meaning in the statement. Suddenly, it dawned on him. "You mean, you…?

"_Me_?"

"Yeah. I mean, you were the first real casualty, Dean. You died, and that started this whole thing. And now you're… well, you know. It was you, wasn't it? You're Will's dad."

Dean shook his head. "Hate to break it you, but I wasn't the one who threw her up on a bar and raped her." He turned away, back toward the door. "You should probably head on in. It's dangerous out here."

He walked away, went back to the safety of the organization's little hidey-hole, leaving Sam alone with a newly-dropped bombshell and very limited mental capacities.


	10. Maybe Redemption Has Stories To Tell

I'm back! And I have a funny story. We've had bad storms coming through all week, and on Saturday night my dad decided to pack up the camper in the dark after I'd already gone to bed and drive the ten miles that it would take us to get hime. I got to sleep in my own bed until two, when I got woken up by bad weather and a tornado warning. One actually touched down in Omaha, but missed us. I can't imagine being stuck in a twister at a campground...

Anyway, now that we've taken inventory of our family (who live near the touch-down spot) and our shingles (which are stil intact) as well as our trees, cars, and camper, here's chapter 10!

* * *

_Chapter 10_

_Maybe Redemption Has Stories To Tell_

He wasn't sure how long he'd stayed in the sewer, just watching that muddy water fly by, but he knew that nearly everyone back at headquarters was asleep by the time he finally decided to return to the company of living, breathing beings.

Sam lay on a hard cot and stared up at the stone ceiling, wishing for sleep, for release, for a way to subconsciously sort out the events of the day. It seemed an eternity ago that he'd had Bela's fresh blood on his hands, that he'd been unable to feel anything at all. It seemed like eons since he'd been possessed, had watched himself do unspeakable things as a cold feminine voice laughed in his head.

He struggled to close his eyes and keep them closed, to block out the day and what it could mean. It was impossible, what Dean had suggested.

_Suggested, or flat-out said?_ a cool voice in the back of his head whispered, _because let's be honest here, buddy-boy. You watched that thing rape her, and you are kinda the spawn of Satan. It all adds up, right?_

He would have retorted, would have said something, but held back. After all, there were sleeping _things_ all around him, undoubtedly dreaming of what was to come the next day, the battle to be waged. He didn't want to risk waking them up.

Something tapped the bottom of Sam's foot, and he cracked his eyes open, almost scared to see what it was. Dean was standing at the end of the cot, an amused expression on his stolen face. "Whatcha doin'?"

"Trying to sleep," Sam whispered, "you have a problem with that?"

Dean grinned. "Come on, man," he said, turning and motioning for Sam to follow him, "got something to show you."

Sam followed, realizing just how easily the action came, how much he trusted this man who acted and spoke and even walked like his brother, but looked nothing like him. The younger hunter was operating on blind trust here, and not caring at all if he was being played. Hell, he didn't even suspect it. Somehow, it was all ok, just as long as he wasn't alone, as long as he could pretend that he'd gotten his brother back.

The pair wove through the cots and scattered sleeping bags, making their way to the back hall where Bela's office sat. Sam wondered where they were going, but didn't bother to ask. He'd missed being able to trust people. It was a good feeling.

Dean led him through a door that stood open at the end of the hall, flipping a switch and illuminating the room with a single bare bulb. Two beds had been pushed against the far wall, with a small table and broken lamp separating them. A cracked mirror hung over a small dresser on the other side of the room, near a table and chair that sat in the corner. A few bad paintings hung on the walls.

"What is this?" Sammy asked. He knew what it _looked_ like, but not what it was actually supposed to be.

"It's my room," Dean said with a grin.

Sam looked over the décor once more. It made sense, he supposed, in a twisted way that could only belong to his brother. Growing up, all they'd really known were motel rooms. It seemed reasonable that, given the chance to have a room all his own, Dean would model it after what he'd always known.

And there were two beds. He tried not to dwell on that.

"How come you get your own cushy room and everyone else gets cots?" he asked as his brother closed the door.

"Because I'm special," Dean replied, "so are Jo and Bela. We're the Big Three, in case you missed it."

"The Big Three?"

"Yeah. As in, Lex, Clark, and Lana. I'm _not_ Lana, by the way."

Sam grinned, walking to a bed and pulling down the sheets, testing the mattress and finding it to be superior to the cot. "And how does one become a member of the _Smallville_ cast?"

"First off," Dean said, digging through the dresser for something suitable to wear to bed, "you have to be pretty. So, sorry, but you're out. Tell you what, though, maybe you can be Jason. He was fun to hate, maim, and kill."

"Great. Just what I've always wanted. A signed death warrant. Seriously though, what's up with your evil council of three?"

"There were more," the older man said, giving up his search and sitting down on the edge of his bed, looking at Sam. "It started with Bela. She found more people. Everyone acted as a soldier, but the really experienced ones got to help with the decision making."

"You and Jo are considered experienced?"

"It was me and Jo, yeah, but there were others. That vampire, Lenore. Rufus Turner acted as a consultant, refused to fight. We had a witch and another vamp that you never would have heard of. And Meg."

"_Meg_?"

Dean nodded. "Meg. She sided with us after you tried to kill her. Not that you didn't get around to it eventually, but…"

"So everyone you just listed," Sam said, "they're all dead? All but you and Jo?"

"One of your goonies got Lenore when she was out on a feed run. Rufus died in his sleep. Old age. The witch was poisoned by a member of her old coven that she thought she could trust. We got her back, by the way. The other vamp was killed in a fight, nothing more than a scuffle, but the other guy had a machete. Meg was on an undercover mission-"

"Like what you do?"

"Yeah. Only she got caught. I like to think I'm smarter than that."

Sam sighed, letting himself slide under the covers, relishing the warmth that suddenly flowed through his system. It couldn't have been the thin sheets. He looked over at Dean, finding himself getting used to the new body, the kid fighting as a soldier in a war that he never should have come to know. Then again, that sounded exactly like the Dean he'd always known.

The older man stood up and crossed the room to turn off the lights, plunging the small room into darkness. Sam could hear him going back to his bed, climbing in, covering up. "Good night, Sammy."

For a moment, he forgot how to respond, had spent so much time missing those words that when he heard them he was dumbstruck. He barely managed to reply, to send out his own nightly wishes for his brother. It was really happening. He'd really gotten his brother back. Had searched the world and found a way, as messed up as the end might have been from his original plan. He'd succeeded. There was just one thing he needed to know.

"What was it like?"

Soft rustling sounds, most likely Dean shifting in the other bed. "What was what like?"

Sam wasn't sure if he should ask, if the subject was sore, but he kind of needed to know, to satisfy a sick curiosity innate in all humans. "Hell."

Dean sighed. "Was wondering when you were gonna ask." He fell silent for a moment, and Sam was afraid that maybe he'd said the wrong thing, made the older man mad. Then Dean spoke, easing Sam's doubts and fears. "Meg said it's a prison made of bone and flesh and blood and fear."

"Is it?"

"No. Not at all. I mean, it's no vacation, but it ain't that bad."

If there was one thing Sam knew about his brother, it was when he was lying. It was subtle in his features, but shone from his eyes, echoed in his words. "Really?"

"Yeah. You need to stop worrying so much about me. I can take care of myself."

"What should I worry about?"

"You know that thing we talked about earlier? Back in the sewer? That's what you should worry about. Doing right by what you've got left instead of focusing so much on what you've lost. Just let me go, Sammy."

"You know I can't do that."

Dean sighed. "Not completely. But you have to try, man, because questing after something you'll never find is gonna kill you inside. You really wanna wind up like dad? You wanna ignore your responsibilities to your family chasing down some damned, dirty demon?"

"You're not-"

"Because that's what you're doing, whether you like it or not. And just like dad, you're gonna destroy yourself. Only you're gonna end up taking everyone and everything down with you." The soft rustle of the sheets sounded again, signaling that Dean had turned away, that the conversation was over. Sam wasn't about to let it go so easily.

"You really expect me to do that? To give up on you and go running to someone who probably hates me? How do I even know you're telling the truth? Demons lie."

The bait was set, but Dean didn't bite. A soft sigh, barely audible, told Sam all that he needed to know about that. He'd gone too far, hit a nerve, made an even bigger mess of things.

"Look, man," he amended, "I didn't mean-"

"Go to sleep, Sam. Big day tomorrow."

Sam sighed, rolling onto his back and staring up at the dark ceiling. "You can tell me the truth, you know. You can tell me what it was like."

"You really want to know?"

"Yeah. I do."

"Imagine being helpless. Not being able to help yourself, or your family, or anyone that you love. Imagine being in constant pain. Having your body cut and pulled and bent in ways it isn't supposed to be. Imagine calling for help and knowing that no one's going to hear you or care. Imagine being alone for all of eternity. That's Hell."

"No," Sam whispered, "that was the last two years."

"But you didn't have to be alone," Dean pointed out, his tone indicating that the subject was closed. And, Sam realized as sleep began invading his body, pulling him from his muddled thoughts and twisted reality, he had a point. Hell was what you made it, where you made it, when you made it. And he'd certainly made it.


	11. The Tension Is Here

Have I recently thanked everyone for reading and reviewing? I know I probably seem like a cold person for not replying personally to every review, but I'm just busy, and there are so many. I also like making excuses for myself :) As usual, I appreciate all the love for the fic. We're nearing the end now, so expect some big stuff!_

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_Chapter 11_

_The Tension Is Here_

"This," Bela said, unrolling a fading map onto the large table that Sam, Dean, and Jo stood around, "is Cold Oak. As far as we know, it's the other side's most active settlement. This," she pointed toward a large square on the map, "is where they're housing whatever it is that they've developed to find our location. It's what we're going to blow up today."

Sam nodded, leaning over the table to see the map more clearly. Apparently, Bela had stayed up most of the night planning a way to take down whatever army he'd managed to amass in the missing eighteen years of his life, and now he was hearing it.

"Jo," she instructed, "take your group and head around from the west. Plant the explosives at the building as subtly as possible and then run."

"Wish Marc was here for this," Dean said, "he always loves the big bangs."

"Nobody's heard from Marc since about an hour after he left yesterday," Bela said, "but I'm sure he's fine. Probably just out of range."

"Thought our psychics could hit Cali from here."

"There must be something blocking him."

"Or someone," Jo offered, "more and more of our people have left and not come back."

"That doesn't mean anything," Dean argued. "For all we know, they're running off to become one with nature."

"Right, because people do that so often when all the plants are dead."

"Hey, rocks are nature."

Bela sighed, massaging her temples. "I swear," she muttered, "it's like working with children. If you two would care to join us as we plan what may very well be the beginning of an all-out war, I'd really appreciate it."

"Sorry," Dean said, turning back to the map that was laid out on the table. "So, Jo takes 'em east-"

"_West_."

"West, then. What about me?"

"You'll be heading here," she pointed toward another square on the simple map, "to the main compound. You'll be acting as our initial distraction. When Jo's team finishes, they'll join you."

"In the fight?" Jo asked.

"No. In knitting a nice little quilt for the demon army from Hell," Dean quipped, "I've already got the pattern picked out and everything."

The blonde ignored him. "How many people are we sending out?"

"Everyone," Bela answered, "we're already at a disadvantage. We're going to need everyone we've got for this one."

"But not Will."

"We can't very well leave him behind."

"Yes," she argued, "we can. He's too young-"

"We've got people nearly half his age fighting," Dean pointed out, "I mean, Hell, Ben started when he was just fifteen."

"But Ben is not your son."

Sam glanced at his brother, unnerved by the sudden silence in the room. The older man's face darkened, but his eyes stayed clear, just staring at the blonde, as if daring her to say more. "Guys?"

"Oh, wait," Jo said, her voice too cheery, manner too over-bright, "that's right. I forgot. There's a reason his mother was killed, wasn't there?" She turned sly eyes on Sam. "You found out, didn't you? I mean, maybe you haven't yet, but you will. And that nephew of yours will send you off the deep end."

Dean had moved before anyone even had time to register the fact. Jo was physically pinned against the wall, in almost the exact same spot she had been the day before. "You shut up about that," Dean whispered, his face mere centimeters from hers, "you don't say a word to him."

"Or what?" she asked, never losing that over-confident air that years of experience in the field had given her, "what are you gonna do, Dean?"

He smirked, and Sam's heart clenched in his chest. He knew it wasn't Dean's face, but it was still Dean, and he hated the malice behind an expression that had once been so comforting to him. "I'm gonna tell Will."

"You'll tell Will what?"

The demon leaned in even closer, until their lips were almost touching. His voice was low, seductive, and sent a shiver down the spine of every person close enough to hear it. "His daddy shot your mommy in the head."

The color drained from Jo's face, her eyes went wide, and her mouth dropped open. Any semblance of confidence she'd had was gone, replaced by shock and fear. "You…?"

"I wasn't gonna say a word to him, but if you tell Ben about me, then so help me-"

Jo nodded, a fast and jerky movement, pressing her body farther into the wall, farther away from Dean. She was totally recognizable to Sam now, a scared little girl in way over her head but unable to stop the wheels from spinning. She was trapped, and she knew it.

"Will's coming with me," Dean said, backing away, his voice back to its usual pitch, "and I'm gonna make sure nothing bad happens to him, ok? You've gotta trust me."

There was no retort, no 'why should I?,' just another meek nod of her head. Dean backed away, walking around the side of the table to regain his earlier spot by the map. "So, how big a distraction do we need?"

o0o0o0o0o0o0o

Surprisingly, Cold Oak hadn't changed. It was still pretty much a muddy pit of despair. Only now, instead of a bunch of psychic kids getting pitted against each other, it housed an army of demons.

"You recognize that building?" Dean asked, nodding toward an old house near the center of the town.

Sam peeked out from behind the bushes they'd hidden themselves in. "Isn't that where we stayed after I…?"

"Yeah. That's the main base. The center hub." He turned, looking through some heavy brush, and pointed to another building. "See that one? That's the warehouse where they're keeping this great invention of theirs."

Sam just nodded. Dean had barely spoken since his outburst back in Bela's office, and the younger man hadn't pushed him. Jo had been freakishly quiet, too, up until they'd stepped out of the office and assembled the troops.

The hunter turned slightly to look over his shoulder at the small group of people rallied behind him. Somehow Will had managed to make it to the forefront of the gathering, his eyes shining with an excitement that he could only have gotten from his mother, his face set with a determination that Sam recognized as his own.

He couldn't help but shudder, at the memories of what he'd been forced to do, and what it meant about his own future. He wished that things weren't moving so fast, that he could have time to think like he always had before, ever since Dean's death. Without the pull of a hunt, or all-out war, he could have wrapped his mind around things, could have figured out how everything had gone to Hell in a heartbeat.

Beside him, something rustled through the dried-out leaves of their pitiful shelter from the enemy's line of sight. He spun to see Bela crawling army-crawling toward him.

Dean turned at about the same time he did, only without any shock visible on his features. "Justine. Hey. I'm guessing Maggie said no, then?"

Bela- or Justine- nodded. "Yeah. These stupid humans want to die free if they have to die at all."

"Looks like you got a host, though."

She smiled. "Well, when Bela said that everyone was going into battle today, she meant _everyone_. Spinal injuries or no." The demon glanced at Sam. "Hey. Good luck today."

He opened his mouth to reply, but was cut off by the sound of more rustling as Jo and her troops moved forward, explosives loaded into backpacks and ready for detonation as soon as they were placed. She glanced back once at her son, at the brothers, at the people that she might never be able to see again, and headed off to do her job.

"She really hates us, doesn't she?" Sam whispered.

"She hates our whole family," Dean responded, keeping his eyes trained on the old ghost town that lay beyond their shelter. "But she doesn't have to. You could change that. I've probably screwed things up beyond repair, and dad wouldn't have a ghost of a chance with her, but you could still fix things."

"What about you?"

"What about me?"

"I know what you're trying to say, Dean, and it's not gonna fly. I'm not leaving you to rot."

"Survey says," Dean muttered, his eyes flickering toward the old house that he had holed up in with a corpse on the night that had changed both their lives forever, "there's a difference between your now and mine, Geekboy. You just haven't lost yourself yet."

"And I won't," Sam argued, "I can still save you."

"You can try. But you're never gonna make it."

"Says who?"

"Says you," the older man said, nodding through the sparse branches toward the house, where a tall figure clad in a long, dark jacket had just opened the door without touching it. Sam was on his feet and running within seconds.


	12. Between Who You Are And Who You Could Be

And this is where it gets interesting. The action you've all been waiting for. So sit down, get comfy, and hold on :D

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Chapter 12

_Between Who You Are And Who You Could Be_

He ignored Dean. He felt bad about it, especially after all that he'd done, all that he'd gone through to get the older man back. He had to know, though. He had to find out why he'd done the things that he'd done, why he'd gone against what he'd hoped was his true nature, kindness and mercy and life.

He also had to save the world, had to help in the only way that he knew he could. He had the knife. He had the element of surprise. He had the experience in the field of killing. He had to murder himself.

It would be hard, he knew, but he could do it. He slipped the knife from its place at his side as he ran, ready for anything. He could barely hear his brother's soft pleas for a safe return as pure adrenalin filled his body.

Sam kicked the door down and barged into the house. There were two guards standing by a staircase, and they looked a bit surprised to see him. Their eyes turned black, and Sam grinned as they ran at him.

_The girl was a brunette. He had trouble picturing her as anything but a blonde, so it had thrown him off-guard. She bared her teeth at him, her eyes turning black, and demanded her knife back. Sam was more than happy to give it to her._

The first demonic guard came in low, probably hoping to knock him off balance. It was in for an unpleasant surprise when Sam finally revealed the blade, jabbing it into the man's stomach and cutting upward, hitting the heart. Warm blood spilled over his shirt and hands, slicking them like grease.

_The little girl turned wide, blue eyes up at him, her face contorting in a mixture of pain, confusion, and fear. It wasn't a little girl, and he knew that, but the look still hurt. Her blood still coated his hands. She dropped to the ground, her pale body standing out in perfect contrast to the black hulk of the Impala in the parking lot behind her. Sam screamed._

He pushed the guard back, dragging the knife from the host's stomach as the demon died in a flash of red light. The other guard looked between the body and the hunter, as if unsure about what to do. Finally, it made up its mind, turning to run away. Sam was too fast for it, caught it as it fled toward the stairs, dug the knife deep into the base of its spine.

_She fell to her knees instantly, just as Sam had nearly three years before. He ripped the knife from her back, her blood on his hands, and leaned in close to her. His long fingers wrapped themselves into her hair and he yanked her head roughly back to stare into her dying eyes. "Go to Hell."_

Sam blinked, bringing himself back to the present, realizing that Hell was here, was now, was him. He swallowed hard, trying to avoid looking at the bodies that lay on the ground. He wiped his hands and the knife on his jacket, a futile attempt to cleanse them of their sins.

He was starting to see why some demons were willfully going back to the pit.

Above him, boards creaked and groaned with weight. Taking a deep breath to steady himself against whatever he might soon have to face, whatever he had become, he started up the stairs.

The rickety wooden staircase led to a short hallway- really more of a platform- with one door leading off it. Adjusting his grip on the now-tacky knife, Sam edged himself toward the door, careful to limit the amount of noise he was making, and placed his hand on the rusting knob. It was surprisingly easy to turn, and the hinges on the door had recently been oiled, a sure sign that someone was living there. Or expecting him, trying to trick him into a false sense of security with ease.

He pushed the door open, his pace agonizing, heart beating out a troubled rhythm in his chest. This was it. Somehow, he'd known that he was going to do it since Jo had first mentioned war, since he had been given the ok to fight. He had to fix things, and killing what he was going to become would definitely help.

As soon as the door was open enough for him to slide through, Sam entered the room. It was bigger than he'd expected it to be, taking up the whole top floor. It was cleaner than the rest of the house, and looked almost new. Two beds had been pushed up against the wall, and for a moment, he was reminded of Dean's room back in the sewer.

He snuck farther into the room, investigating, looking for signs of life. Large windows looked out over the town of Cold Oak, sending in streams of gray light. A few paintings hung on the walls, obviously relics of the house's old days, before psychics and demons had claimed the town. A large, rectangular box covered in a red sheet had been positioned at the foot of one of the beds, and something inside was rustling. Sam approached it slowly, his muscles tensing, readying for whatever might jump out.

A white flash illuminated the room, strobing in through the windows and marking Sam's shadow against the wall. Years of training had him on the ground with his arms over his head in mere seconds as the sound of the explosion rocked the town.

The ringing in his ears died down as a new noise filled the air. Shouting, yelling, screaming. The sound of gunfire, of Latin, of metal-on-metal in combat. He was sure that if he looked out one of the windows, he would see war.

Sam stood on shaky feet, the knife still clutched in his hand. He turned toward the windows, momentarily distracted from his own self-appointed mission. He was reminded of it by the sound of the door slamming.

Sammy spun, knife held at the ready, to face the door. No one was there. The room was empty. Unless…

He spun again, this time toward the covered container by the beds. He didn't think, just reacted, tried to make himself go numb inside the way he had after Dean's death, tried not to think about what he was doing. He just wanted it to be over with.

Sam lunged at the dark figure, slashing at it, hoping to hit it, to make some kind of blow that would result in its death, because what he could see of the thing made him believe that it _couldn't_ be him.

He felt the knife hit skin, though it was a glancing blow, a flesh wound. If he'd had more time to prepare, more leverage, more traction, more _anything_, he could have gone straight through the ribcage to the heart. Instead, he nicked the flesh directly above it before flying across the room, pushed by invisible hands.

The figure stepped forward as Sam's head connected with the wall. It looked at him, its head cocked in a perfect imitation of a curious puppy. "Well, I'll be damned," it said, the familiarity of the voice sending shivers down Sam's spine. The thing walked up to him, and any doubts about its identity were stripped from the hunter's mind.

He was staring at himself. An older version of himself, one with longer hair and a slight inkling of gray at the temples, but Sam Winchester, nonetheless. Only, it- he- was wrong. His eyes weren't green, weren't compassionate, weren't even human. Specks of red floated in the irises, spinning like a tornado of fire, boring into his soul. The face was hard, angular, gaunt. Evil.

"Looks like I've got a guest," the thing Sam had somehow become said, his face splitting into a wicked grin.

"Looks like you do," Sam agreed as his double approached, taking Ruby's knife from fingers weakened by whatever hold he had over the younger man.

"I remember this," he said, "Ruby's, right? Remember how that bitch begged and screamed? That was a fun kill."

Sam just turned away, suddenly sickened by what he was seeing, what he was hearing. "Shut up."

"Oh, come on, Sammy. You enjoyed it. And you'll keep enjoying it, for many years to come. After all, you can't fight destiny."

"I don't believe in destiny," the hunter muttered.

The older psychic nodded sadly, tossing Ruby's knife to the side, watching it skitter across the floor. "Neither does Dean."

Sam's head snapped back over to look at the thing holding him captive. "You remember him?"

"Of course I remember him. He's my brother."

"But, he told me-"

The thing with the red eyes laughed. "Seriously? You believed him?" He sighed. "You and Bela and Jo. Rule number one, Sammy-boy. Demons lie. Remember that? The phantom traveler in Pennsylvania? That was Dean's rule. Made you feel all warm and fuzzy inside, didn't it?"

"He didn't lie to me."

"Oh, really? So, he didn't tell you some sob story about me leaving him in Hell? Because that was our cover for him, if I remember right."

"What are you talking about?" Sam asked as the day before flashed through his mind, forcing him to recall every odd comment Dean had made, every weird look.

His captor grinned. "Forgot how stupid I used to be. I spent fifteen years trying to save my brother. You really think I was just gonna let him rot because destiny came knocking? You think an army of smoky black clouds was really more important to me than blood? What kind of inconsiderate bastard do you think you are, Sam?"

He looked away, back toward the windows, trying to clear his muddled thoughts, his confused mind. "No."

"I broke into Hell and I found him. You should have seen him," the older man said, his voice breaking, "he was all chained up, suspended, like a piece of meat on a hook. For _fifteen years_. I saved him, got him down, hand-picked a host for him. I found that Tyler kid and made sure he wouldn't put up a fight."

"You killed him?"

"I gave Dean a body that wouldn't fight him off. Like an organ donor. Skin's an organ, right?" The same cold edge that had been there when he'd first stepped from the shadows crept back into his voice, choking off any semblance of human emotion that might have been there. His eyes were cold and dark.

"You killed an innocent kid."

"No. _You_ did. And then you got your brother back. And we're happy. Just like old times. He plays spy for me now. He got them to come to me. And now no one's going to stop us from being a family."

"You're twisted," Sam snapped, "and you're lying. Dean would never side with you."

"I'm-"

"You're _not_ his brother. You're not _me_."

The older man smiled, backing away from the wall, appraising Sam. "Give it time. Just give it time." He turned suddenly toward the door, his smile growing wider, warming as his eyes lost that coldness.

Sam followed his- own?- gaze to the door just as it was flung open and Dean stepped in, a large smirk planted firmly on his stolen face. Before the younger man could even open his mouth to speak, the older psychic had crossed to the door and pulled the demon into a fierce hug.

"Relax," Dean said, struggling from the embrace, "I told you I'd come back."

The older man nodded. "Yeah. I know, but I was so excited. Dean, I got you something."

Sam wrinkled his nose in a mixture of confusion and disgust. It was hard to miss the change that had come over the red-eyed figure since Dean's appearance, even in that short amount of time. He seemed softer, acted different, almost like a kid who'd gotten lost in the mall, only to find his mother a couple of stores away. Yeah, he was acting like a kid who'd been lost… or abandoned.

He figured he could muse about that later, though. He had something to get to the bottom of. "You lied to me."

Dean turned, apparently surprised to see him pinned to the wall. "Oh, hey, Sammy. Was wondering where you'd run off to."

"You lied!"

"What can I say?" Dean shrugged, his eyes turning black, "it's the nature of the beast."

"Dean," the older psychic whined, pulling on the young host's arm and looking every bit like the child Sam had mentally compared him to. "Come on. You've gotta see it!"

"In a minute," Dean sighed, shaking what used to be his sibling from his arm. "Gotta talk to the prisoner." He stepped up to the wall, gazing at Sam with a content look on his face.

"They haven't found a way to break the troops, have they?" Sam asked, staring down at the demon as the numbness once again seeped into his soul, invading him, cooling him to world. He didn't try to fight it. Maybe if Dean had stayed Dean, if Sam had stayed Sam, then there would be something worth fighting for. But Dean was a demon, Sam was a leader, and nothing could change the Hell they'd been through. It was easier to just not feel the disappointment than to face it head-on.

"No," Dean said. "We haven't. But we're working on it. And now that we've got a whole new batch of guinea pigs, it'll be a hell of a lot easier to develop."

"What happened to you?"

"The same thing that happened to you. _Hell_." He stepped away from the wall, turned to face the brother that had sprung him from Hell, had put him to work as a spy, had made him lie, had made him a demon. "All right, Sammy. What is this _amazing_ thing that you've got for me?"

Sam let himself hang limp on the wall. He was done. They couldn't kill him, couldn't risk hurting the future ruler of a demonic world, but they could use him, make his reign come faster. And he wouldn't fight it. There was nothing to fight. Destiny had won out. Destiny had stated that people who went to Hell became demons and that Sam was set to lead their army. That had happened. Fighting it was pointless.

The man he would become stood behind the covered box, smiling like an idiot. At least, if this _was_ destiny, Sam would have his brother. They could still be a family. A messed up family, but a family, nonetheless. Maybe that would be worth all of the chaos and destruction that he left in his wake. Maybe it was worth it.

The man beside the box was still grinning, bouncing on his feet, happier than Sam had been for a long time. "I know how much you want your own body back," he was saying, his eyes never leaving Dean, "and I remember you telling me that you'd talked to one of their shifters about hopping hosts."

Dean nodded. "Yeah. So?"

"_So_," the psychic said. "I got you a present." He pulled the red cover off of the box, revealing a cage. Inside the cage sat a man, looking very unhappy and just a little drugged.

"Marc?" Sam asked, recognizing the man that he'd met in the sewer the day before.

"He's yours," the older version of Sam said, ignoring the hunter still pinned to the wall, "so you can be yourself again, Dean."

Dean smiled. "Sammy, I don't know what to say. I've been waiting to get a shifter for a long time." He stared into the cage, inspecting what was soon to be his new host, before looking back up at his brother. His eyes narrowed. "You're bleeding."

The psychic glanced down at himself, the big smile never fading, even as he found the blood seeping through the front on of shirt. He pulled the fabric down and away from his skin, revealing fading ink lines carved into his skin. A pentagram inside a sunburst, marred by a single line of blood.

"Oh," he said, "yeah. Just a flesh wound. Kid must've done it when he came at me with his little sticker. No big deal." He looked back up at Dean, red eyes shining. "So, I did good?"

The demon nodded, his eyes flashing with some unidentifiable emotion that the older psychic apparently didn't catch. "Yeah, Sammy. You did great."

"Well, go on. Hop in. I'll look away while you change if you want."

"All right," Dean said, smiling. "I think I'll do that." The boy's mouth opened wide, unleashing a stream of black smoke into the air. Sam watched as the smoke swirled overhead, forming into something that vaguely resembled his brother, necklace and all. The cloud crossed the room, heading toward the cage, but changed course at the last minute, forcing the psychic's mouth open and invading the body of the man responsible for bringing Hell to Earth.


	13. Maybe Forgiveness Is Right Where You

Sorry this is going up so late in the day, but we had a bunch of storms last night, including a tornado warning that lasted for THREE FREAKIN' HOURS! Then I debated on whether or not to update today, decided that I like you all, and here it is. The final chapter should be up tomorrow :)_

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_Chapter 13_

_Maybe Forgiveness Is Right Where You Fell_

Sam stood on shaky feet, narrowed eyes watching the lanky figure that stood behind the cage. His head came up, long hair hanging in a sallow face. Red eyes blazed, as if fighting for control, as pools of black formed behind the irises, eventually blotting out any color. The eyes closed, and when the reopened, they were bright green.

"Dean?" Sam asked, taking a cautious step toward the body his brother had disappeared into.

Thin lips twisted into a smile. "How ya doin', Sammy?"

"I'm confused."

"You should be."

"Who the Hell are you fighting for?"

Dean reached down and sprung the latch on the cage, swinging the door open. Marc looked up at him with steadily clearing eyes, and Sam realized that whatever had knocked the shape-shifter out had been psychic in nature. "Go," he instructed, "we need help." Marc nodded and left the room.

"You tricked me," Sam said.

"I tricked _two_ of you," Dean clarified. "You're rusty."

"Explain."

Dean shrugged. "You sprung me outta Hell about five years ago, found me a suitable host," he nodded over to the place where his old body had fallen, dead. "You knew that there were people trying to fight you, so you sent me out to spy on them, came up with this whole sad story about you losing yourself. Sad part was, it was pretty much true. I didn't want to leave you alone again. Dunno if you picked up on it, but you're different when I'm here."

He nodded. "Yeah. I did. Almost like a little kid."

"An _eager_ little kid." Dean added. "Anyway, I found Bela, gave her my story, and was in. I didn't think she'd trust me so easy, but I guess she felt bad about what happened."

"So you really were working for the bad guys?"

"Hell, no. Let's just say I had my own agenda."

"And what was that?"

The demon smiled. "Keeping you safe. I didn't leak any really important stuff about the resistance to you, but I leaked all kinds of stuff about this place to them. I stopped after Meg."

"After I killed her?"

"Her last mission was an assassination attempt. She was gonna kill you."

"Would have done the world a favor," Sam said, finding himself relaxing again, believing Dean like he always had, even though the man was a damned good liar and he had just witnessed proof of it.

"I knew I could get through," the demon insisted. "You saw yourself, the way you changed when I walked in. You're still in there. I know it. I'm not sure what I did last time to make you think that it was hopeless, but-"

"What are you talking about?"

Dean shoved his stolen hands into his stolen pockets and sighed, finally moving out from behind the cage to stand in front of Sam, looking him the eye. "Time is a loop. Eighteen years ago, this you," he motioned toward the body he was currently inhabiting, "came here. I guess I couldn't get through then, because this still happened. But you can change that."

"It's destiny," Sam said, shaking his head. "I felt it back there, when you were talking to him. People who go to Hell become demons, and I'm-"

"You don't have to do anything you don't want to."

"What do you want me to do, Dean? Leave you to rot?"

"Come here," Dean said. He grabbed Sam's arm and pulled him roughly to the windows, shoving him up against the glass and pointing out at the muddy roads. "What do you see?"

Sam looked out the window, looked at what was taking place on the streets of Cold Oak. Demons were fighting humans and witches and vampires and werewolves and other demons and it was a bloodbath. In the middle of the fray, he could make out the figure of a petite blonde cradling something in her arms. Her son's head lolled limply against her chest as she screamed at the heavens for taking her only family.

"Will…"

"You know what you have to do," Dean said, placing a warm hand on Sam's shoulder and pulling off the younger man's own puppy-dog eyes to perfection.

"I'm not gonna leave you." But the conviction left his voice as he watched a demon stab a splintered board through Jo's midsection, impaling her against her son's cooling body.

"I dug my grave," Dean whispered, "I don't want to be responsible for digging yours, too."

Sam turned to look at his brother. "I don't want to be alone."

"You won't be. You still have a family. I'll be sure to thank Meg for you."

He snorted laughter, but it came out wrong, like a sob. "I did bad things."

"Let you in on a little secret, dude," Dean said, leaning in close, "the cord isn't severed, but movement will snap it."

Sam backed away. "What the Hell was that?"

"You're the smart one. Figure it out."

"Anymore advice?"

Dean smiled. "Forgive and forget? What's dead should stay dead? Oh, how about, go be your baby daddy?"

"I can't do that."

"If you don't, you've got this to look forward to."

Sam gazed back out of the window, looking down at the carnage that war and his own selfish wants had brought. Suddenly, just as sure as he'd known it was Dean, as sure as he'd known his brother was hiding something, he knew that the older man was right. "You can send me back now?"

"Now? Yeah. You have no idea how powerful you really are."

He looked at what he had become and shuddered. "I don't want to know."

Dean nodded. "Good choice. Now, you gonna do what I said?"

Tears burned behind his eyes, but Sam fought them off, thankful as he was to feel them there after so many dry years. "Yeah. I will."

"Guess you're going back, then."

"What are you gonna do?"

"Me? Well, I don't have anything to worry about, because you're gonna make sure I never wind up inside of you."

"That's disgusting."

"Close your eyes."

"Not after that!" Smiling at his own wit, he did as he was told. Dean placed two large hands on his shoulders, and the world began to spin. Wind whipped around his face, sending his dirty, bloody clothes flapping around his body as his stomach dropped and his feet left the ground. He was falling, falling away from a future that was anything but bright, falling away from what could have been, falling away from his brother. And that was the way that it had to be.

o0o0o0o0o0o

His head hurt again. His head hurt and he was dizzy and disoriented.

Slowly, Sam struggled up into a sitting position on the floor. The altar was in front of him, with the sundial in the center. The thought of Bela, of what he'd done, of what her life would be like, sickened him. He welcomed the sickness, the displeasure, any emotion in this time. He felt like he was coming back.

He stood, his feet shaky beneath him, and frowned at the lack of weight at his side. He'd left the knife. He'd left the knife in a future that was never going to happen. He was going to honor his brother's request. The knife wasn't important. Too dirty, anyway.

He stretched, sticking his fist into the small of his back, waiting for the familiar popping sound as his knuckles slid over the slightly raised scar that Jake had left when he'd severed Sam's spinal cord.

The cord…

"The cord isn't severed," Sam muttered, "but movement will snap it." His eyes widened as he realized exactly what that meant. "Bela!" He dove over the bed, grabbed the phone, and dialed 911 in one swift motion. He only hoped the paramedics got to her before she came to and tried to reach a phone by herself, finishing off Sam's handiwork and losing all feeling in her legs forever.


	14. Salvation Is Here

All right. Last chapter. hopefully it wraps everything up all nice and tight with a pretty blue bow on top :)

Anyway, thanks again to everyone who's read and reviewed and fave'd and all that jazz. It makes me feel all warm nad fuzzy inside, and I can only hope that this final chapter makes you all warm and fuzzy inside, too. That being said...

* * *

_Chapter 14_

_Salvation Is Here_

**Three Years Later**

Three years. Three years and he finally had normal. He had a son who would be six years old in only a matter of months, a house in the suburbs, and a woman who wasn't his wife, but nagged him just the same. Still, something was missing.

The first few notes of 'Happy Birthday' reached his ears as something small and warm struggled up into his lap. Sam looked down at the little blond boy and smiled. William Dean Winchester. Jo had been nice enough to give up her rights to a surname.

"Daddy, you have to open my present first." Willy shouted, bouncing up and down in his father's lap.

"All right," Sam smiled, gently moving the boy to a less painful position for bouncing, "I will." He still had trouble looking at the boy and not seeing an adult curled in his mother's arms, lifeless and pale and spattered with mud. He still had trouble looking at Jo and not seeing her pinned to the wall by a demon, shaking and scared. He supposed that would take time.

Will slid off his dad's lap and into a chair of his own as his mother entered the room with a large birthday cake, complete with flaming candles. "Happy Birthday, dear Sammy," she sang, "happy birthday to you." She set the cake down in front of him and smiled. "Make a wish."

He tried to match her grin, but found it hard. Ever since his first birthday with her, he'd made the same wish, and it never came true. Still, it couldn't hurt to try.

_Dean_, he thought, blowing out the candles with his eyes closed.

Willy clapped his hands, still bouncing up and down, waiting for a big slice of cake. Jo took a seat next to Sam and gazed at him, concern apparent in her soft gaze. "Sammy-"

"I never thanked you, did I?" he asked. "For letting me stay here?"

"Well, I couldn't very well say no, could I? And once you told me how you found out about us…"

He nodded. He'd told her everything. He'd told her everything and had been pleasantly surprised when she'd sympathized. She'd let him in, let him know his son, let him have what he'd always thought would make him happy until Dean had sold his soul and put things in perspective. He'd never wanted normal. He'd always wanted family.

"Thanks anyway," he smiled. "We should cut the cake before Will hurts himself."

"Yeah, all right." She chuckled as she pulled the candles from the frosting and cut the first piece, sliding it onto Will's plate. "Listen," she said, dropping her voice to a whisper the way she always did when Will was in the room and she didn't want him to hear, "about what brought you here-"

"It's what Dean wanted me to do," he said, "and I think he was right. He was too late to control me before, but you… you're a different story."

"Actually," Jo said, sliding a piece of cake onto Sam's plate and biting her lower lip, "it's about Dean."

He watched her sit down, watched her stare at him. "What about him?"

"I know how much you miss him, and, honestly, I miss him, too."

"Yeah, but-"

"And I know he told you to stop trying to save him because he doesn't regret what he did. But it's killing you inside, just thinking about what he's going through."

"Every day."

She sighed, finally casting her eyes down and away from his. "So, I've been digging for you."

Sam felt his eyes get wide. "What?"

"Yeah. I talked to mom and Bobby and they went looking for help. About a year ago, one of Bobby's friends, this guy named Ronald, or Rufus, or Reggie, or something contacted me. He has a friend who does body work."

The hunter felt himself relax. For a moment, he'd been worried that Jo had done something that they would all regret, had sold something invaluable to help him. This didn't sound like a deal, though. "You're gonna have someone fix up the Impala?"

And then she confirmed his fears in a way that both worried and intrigued him. "Not that kinda body."

"What did you do?"

"This guy's a psychic healer. Bobby's heard of him, his friend swears by him. Sam, he can take a body so torn up and demolished that it isn't even recognizable anymore and make it as good as new."

"What's the price?"

"That's the thing," Jo said, "there's no price. He's one of the good guys, and he works on hunters for free."

He sighed, leaning his elbows on the table in front of him as Willy munched happily on his piece of cake. "What are you trying to tell me, Jo?"

She glanced at Will and smiled. "Grave r-o-b-b-i-n-g runs in the family. There was just one more thing."

Sam nodded. He could feel hope and faith rising within him, could remember that certainty that Dean had been right back in Cold Oak, that going to his family and making things right would be better than questing after a damned soul. Now he _knew_ that Dean had been right. "Jo?"

"About a month ago, I got a phone call outta the blue from this chick who says she knows how to help with that last part. Apparently, she's got a darn good Ouiji board at her disposal, because nobody else I talked to had ever heard of this summoning ritual. The girl checked out, though."

"Why would she help you?" Sam asked, suddenly suspicious.

Jo shrugged. "Said you saved her life a while back and she owed you big time. Said you saved her legs or something?"

"What was her name?"

"Abbey something. Her last name started with an R, I think."

Sam smiled. "The cord wasn't severed," he muttered.

"What's that?"

"Uh, nothing. Just a helpful hint someone dropped for me once. So, what about this ritual? Was it legit?" He tried to keep the hopeful tone out of his voice, he really did, but he could hear it sneaking in. Somehow, though, he didn't care.

Jo opened her mouth to answer him, but was cut off by a loud knocking at the door. She started to stand, but Will held up his empty plate, using his inherited puppy-dog eyes to ask for more without asking.

"I'll get it," Sam offered, "we'll finish up when I get back, ok?" The woman he was living with just smiled and nodded as he left the kitchen.

The house was small, but safe; protected by Devil's Traps carved into doorframes and lines of salt hidden under paneling so that tiny fingers didn't disturb them. He walked to the front door, a little annoyed that someone had interrupted something that could potentially mean so much to him… and to Dean. Dean was the one he was really worried about.

He pulled the door open and blinked. He was hallucinating. He was absolutely sure that he was hallucinating until the hallucination spoke.

"Hey, there, Sammy. Happy birthday."

Sam blinked again at his brother, smiling as he realized that the older man was real, was alive, looked exactly as he had before those damned hounds had ripped into him. This time, when the tears burned behind his eyes, he didn't try to hold them back. "Dean?"

"In the flesh," he said, spreading his arms and grinning wide. A large blue bow had been set on top of his head, matching the dark blue t-shirt and faded jeans he was wearing. "You, uh, gonna invite me in?"

Sam sobbed, trying to think. "Um… I… there are traps and salt, and-"

Dean stepped into the house and wrapped warm, solid, strong arms around his brother. "Since when has that stopped me?"

Sam returned the hug, grasping the older man tightly until he felt something pop under his embrace. "You're not…?"

"Not after five years. Besides, someone little Abbey contacted really came through. The ritual isn't just about summoning. It's about binding. And it returns the soul to the shape it was in before getting ripped so rudely out."

"You're human?"

"Yeah. And a guy. So you can let go of me now."

Sam squeezed him tighter before letting go, then stepped back to look at his brother. "You're really here?"

"And I'm not going anywhere." Dean looked around the small entryway. "Nice digs." Jo stepped out of the kitchen, smiling. "Not so sure about the roomie, though. You totally could have done better."

"You're welcome," Jo said, crossing her arms in front of her chest as Will peeked around her legs.

"Oh," Dean cooed, smiling down at the boy, "and this must be the little shotgun… I mean, kid."

Jo scowled. "We're not married, j-a-c-k-a-s-s-."

Dean raised an eyebrow. "Come again?"

"It spells 'jackass,'" Sam whispered.

"Oh. You know what, guys? I think this is the beginning of a beautiful living arrangement."

"You are _not_ living with us," Jo scoffed.

Sam just smiled as they argued, motioning Will over and lifting the boy in his arms. Dean was wrong. It wasn't the beginning of something, not for him. It was the end. The end of sleepless nights, of numbing days, of biting fear and loneliness. The end of Hell on Earth.

And it felt great.

* * *

The end.

Come on. Y'all knew I wasn't gonna leave the Deanster to rot for all eternity, right? I may be sadistic, but I'm not that bad!

Hope you enjoyed reading as much as I enjoyed writing. Until next time,

Michelle Shavlik


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